Like most of you, I’m staying up way too late watching the Olympic coverage. I admitted on Facebook that usually it is straight-up patriotic fever that has me so captivated.

This year, the drama and backstories have captured my attention.

I admit, I’m not proud that I’m sucked in by the drama of a finger wave or a “Phelps Face.” These are athletic competitions that they have trained years for. But I believe the writer in me can’t stay away from the cold war implications of the Lilly King finger wave or the backstory Michael Phelps has going with his intense look. It’s hard to look away against the backdrop of his come back from the bottom of an emotional pit story.I’m trying to find the good in what I’ve seen, even if there is drama attached to it.

Here are my observations so far.

• Yes, Lilly King has some sass going on and perhaps you see her as a bad sport. But as a “justice girl,” I understand her frustration. I’m not a competitive swimmer, but boy I work hard at my craft. I want to present a quality product and engage with peers and readers. When I see a person come along and publish their first draft story and call themselves “an author like you” or, like I wrote before, the fan fiction writer who turned her poorly written but “hot” pages into a runaway bestseller, I die a little inside. The Russian athletes have been dogged with doping, and I think I read that swimmer had two bad tests against her. It has to be frustrating to compete against someone who appears to be trying to short cut to success.

The “Phelps Face.” NBC/@BobbyWFrancis/Twitter

• Michael Phelps said he was in a place of intense focus when his competitor was shadow boxing right in front of him. A lot of memes have popped up since then, some hilarious, I admit. But I love hearing about his focus and how not long ago, he was only remembered as the athlete caught doing drugs. His reality took him to a dark place and it was Christian athlete Ray Lewis who mentored and encouraged Phelps, even by giving him the book The Purpose Driven Life. Michael Phelps seems to be in the middle of a redemption story (not perfect, but redeemed.) When I see the meme and the Phelps face, it inspires me against my own warfare. There is so much that hits me behind the scenes as I write. Mind games. Loneliness. Doubt. And that devil, the real defeated one, boy he loves to shadow box in front of my face.

And the Phelps face for me is all, “Not today, devil. Not today.”

What lessons are you taking away from the Olympics? What is your favorite sport to watch?

By the way, there’s still time to enter my Goodreads Giveaway. One winner in either the US, Canada, UK or Australia will win a signed copy of ENTRUSTED & ENTANGLED.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Entangled

by Julie Arduini

Giveaway ends August 29, 2016.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway