Redefining 'classy'

I love having athlete-crushes. I adore watching people who do things I can't even imaging doing, and I love the completely genuine, no-caveats respect I'm able to give truly great athletes. It's not a big thing- most of my crushes last for the length of an Olympics and are forgotten (except the truly astonishing, like Shaun White, or the ones that keep themselves in the public eye other ways, like Apollo Ohno), except in the few sports I follow on a yearly basis (basically just swimming and figure skating), where I'm utterly crazy about them for about two weeks per year.

But I absolutely do not fool myself into thinking they're anything but athlete-crushes. I don't know anything about these people, and my respect is narrowly about their physical abilities and dedication and mental toughness, perhaps leavened a little bit with soft-focus NBC human interest segments and a little bit of interview-charisma. I don't know enough about them for anything more than an athlete-crush, and I try to remember that.

( But this Olympics... )

In other words, between a picture of Evan now appearing in the dictionary under "sportsmanship" and "graciousness," and Johnny being my hero and unbelievably classy, mens' figure skating this year has made it very hard for me to keep my athlete-crushes strictly athletic.