Dear LPG readers,

It is on the not so distant horizon now and getting closer again.  I felt that someone should acknowledge its impending presence although the majority of those who visit this website are more likely to regard competitive sport as a distant memory by now. The games will soon be with us again and, while there are many other athletic competitions, this is the big one!  

I cannot say that I follow the Olympics relentlessly.  But back in 2012 when the games were held on our UK doorsteps, I was there on at least one occasion.  I remember the torch procession which passed by the bottom of the road that I live in that year, and I was out there with the other members of my family cheering it on.  Although it was hard to see Doreen Lawrence underneath it (I think that is who was carrying it at the time), I did get a glimpse of the torch’s ‘lit-up’ end.  There were freebies to be had on the day and I remember walking home with my bottle of Coca-Cola and a little flag pole thing that had green and yellow ribbons at the end.  

I remember getting up early to be ready on time and walking down to the end of my road and the high street but I have to be honest and say that I don’t really know why I felt it so important to be there.  I like to think that my sense of patriotism kicked in, but perhaps it was more about right now.  Could it be that, years later, I just wanted to be able to say, ‘I was there’.  I took my digital camera with me and have a few pictorial memories although getting them was chaotic, but the question that I ask myself all these years later is just how patriotic our nation is.  

If I ever was interested in any sport, I was more interested in playing them (something that I have never excelled at either).  I have to say that when it comes to the actual games, or following any sport event I was, and continue to be, more of a ‘news highlights’ watcher and there was more than one occasion in the following three weeks when I felt cheated because my favourite soap opera was postponed or rescheduled so that some athletic event could be shown live. 

Did you know that the modern Olympic games were first held in 1896?   And I should remind readers of the 2016 Rio Olympics, and the 2020 games which were held in Tokyo, but it happened 12 years ago for us in the UK and, I still have my ribbon-stick as proof that I was there! 

WL, Lewisham. 

WL   shares some memories of the Olympic games that we are most likely to have been the closest to…

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