Goldfish Asylum

Recently, I received a copy of the DVD with my 400m freestyle (the first time I typed that, I typed "40mm" - imagine a 40mm swimming race) race from Athens 2004. It was a wee while ago, and you may or may not know how pitifully I performed there, so you can imagine it's been a while since I've seen footage of the race.

It's an event I'm very much in two minds about. In one, I'm a tiny little bit (I mean TINY. I'm not being falsely humile about this either) proud that I was able to compete at the Olympics when I was eighteen years old. To add to that, I actually looked the part (if you ignore my height, that is. In 2004, I was all of 4'11"), with big shoulders, a ripped back, as well as being what now seems to be extremely thin. I'm sure that's just flabby 2010 me being jealous, though. Something I'm not envious of is that hair "style" - it being the remnants of a head shaving that took places five months prior.

Of course, a much larger part of me is still hugely disappointed with how I fared in Athens - sixth in my heat, and nowhere near the final I should have medalled in. The look on my face in my post-race interview conveys that pretty well. And contrary to Keith Quinn's (he was a pooldeck commentator there) wee muse that "in retrospect, I think she'll be very happy with that", I'm not, nor have I ever been.

Years after Shane Gould (you may have noticed I'm a bit of a Shane Gould fan - this is because I used to share her best events, the 200m freestyle and IM races, before moving "up" in the world to the 400m and 800 frees) retired, she lamented the fact that in the 1970s (Munich 1972 was her hey-day), no psychological post-retirement support was offered to Olympic athletes. In my case, more than anything I needed post-race support. Upon my return to the Olympic Village after doing a "deck change" at the pool, having not warmed down or even showered, I literally crumpled into a heap on the floor of the room I shared with my then-coach, Jo. Within minutes I re-emerged from the room, then went about the rest of the day and the rest of my time in the Village as if nothing - not even a race - had happened.

There was the Ethiopian flag incident. This is my favourite story from Athens, even though most people I tell don't think it's that great. Outside the dining room in the Athens Olympic Village was a paved area, where all the flags of the competing nations were raised (there was even a flag-raising ceremony for each country. We shared ours with the USA and Azerbaijan). On the day before the Games finished, I trundled up to the hall, flanked by my posse of sorts. We noticed the volunteers were taking the flags down, and I had what I considered at the time to be the greatest idea of my life. It was my opportunity to take the Ethiopian flag! Flag-collecting was something of a swimming trip tradition - I had the flags of the US, Norway and Brazil from previous excursions. We went inside and over lunch, hatched a "plan" - which, in retrospect wasn't much of a plan at all. It just involved me taking an empty bag to the flag site, lowering the flag and then taking it. It worked for Dawn Fraser in Tokyo - almost. Easy peasy.

I walked back outside - cleverly dressed in my New Zealand uniform, and still wearing my Olympic accreditation around my neck - and "hid" behind a small shed (which, of course, turned out to be a security office). At what seemed the most optimal moment, I approached the flagpole with the Ethiopian flag hoisted high in the air, unwound the rope and started lowering it. Of course, due to the intermittent wind gusts that plague Maroussi (that's the city the Olympic Village was in), while the flag was on its way down, a few times the wind got the better of me, so anyone within a 50-yard radius could probably tell what was happening. I ignored it, and once the flag was within reach, I freed it from the rope, folded it as quickly as I could, and stuffed it into my backpack. Rather than scampering away, I attempted a casual walk out from behind the office.

"Stop, stop stop." A young, grinning Greek man stepped in front of me. I hadn't considered this.
"What have you got in your bag?" he asked.
"Δεν μιλούν ελληνικά!!" I insisted, and he burst out laughing.
"Clearly, you speak Greek perfectly well. What have you got in your bag?" he asked again, his English as good as my thoroughly practiced Greek. I sighed and opened my bag, revealing my treasured flag. He continued to laugh.
"But why do you want this?"
"It's my favourite country!"
"You wait here. I must discuss this with the other men." He walked off, with my bag, to a group of other volunteers, and they agreed, in Greek, that I could keep it. He did mention, though "we must ask the women."
The women were decidely less fun than the men.
"Why are you laughing?" they demanded. "This is not funny! You are very bad!"
"I think it's hilarious!" I replied in a deadpan tone, as was customary for 2004 me. The women were outraged that I would take a flag, and they made me fold it up and put it in the box with the flags of all the other countries.
"You should not be laughing. You should be ashamed." they told me, and shooed me away. I returned, defeated, to the dining room.

Anyway.

The point of this post was not to illustrate my two failings in Athens but rather the power of memories and how much of a paradox they are. Sometimes I wish I could forget every minute of Athens - the petty arguments I had with Jo, the moment on my race day morning that I realised I'd forgotten to bring accreditation, the earbashing I got from another team member for spilling water on the bathroom floor (yes, really). Of course, I also wish I could forget every second of that awful race but through the power of DVD I remember it all. Vividly. Honestly - watching it makes me remember it even more. There was the almost-inability to even walk from the final marshalling room to pooldeck due to nerves, the initial feelings of "this is good! I could win this!" (that's actually a quote from a track meet later that year) which inevitably - within 50 metres - gave room to a more sickening feeling, that I was losing ground and despite putting together what should have been my best race on record (based on form not only in camp in Athens, but also the months leading up to the Games), I was just failing. Badly. There was the final 50m, where every fibre in my body screamed at me to finish better, and of course, worst of all, there was the moment where I saw my time on the scoreboard, and as such, the moment my heart broke. (Luckily, the DVD is shot from such a distance that the expletive I let loose upon seeing the time, can't be heard. But I still remember.)
It didn't end there - unfortunately, at the Olympics, even if your heart is broken and you doubt your ability to remove your goggles, let alone remove yourself from the pool - you have to get out. So what followed was the heartbroken hauling of myself out of the water, the heartbreaking walk to be interviewed, then the saddest, loneliest walk of my life to the warm down pit, where I perched on a start block for a few moments before shrugging and trudging back inside to find my equally heartbroken coach.

So yes, at times I wish I had a goldfish memory.