wherefore art thou michelle kwan?

i'm still reeling from the news that michelle kwan has withdrawn from the national figure skating championships due to a nagging injury. though she's petitioning for one of the 3 spots on the olympic team as is her right, even if she gets selected she still would only be able to compete if she were healthy. it's not about her winning gold, though i know she thrives on competition. she's a 9 time u.s. champion, 5 time world champion and 2 time olympic medalist (silver and bronze). she doesn't need any more metal and ribbon. she does need competition to help bring out her best.

it's about her sheer artistry transcending the crass commercialism of the games. her beauty and power and line superseding the infuriating soft focus music video featurettes and incessant breaks in the action that are nbc's unfortunate olympic calling cards. and making irrelevant the generally annoying skating commentators. her daring performance of bolero at last year's nationals showcased her artistic bravado. i have never seen anyone do a solo performance to bolero. it's already sacred in the ice skating world thanks to torville and dean's 6.0 tour de force ice dance gold medal winning performance in '84, but to do it again and do it as a solo - incredible. her bolero was choreographed by christopher dean so it was an important moment for him as well.

but now, no michelle. the u.s. does have a deep field of skaters, most notably sasha cohen, exceptional but inconsistent, and kimmie meisner, only the second u.s. female skater in history to perform the triple axel, the first being working class heroine, and future u.s. hubcap throwing champion, tonya harding. sasha and kimmie are virtual locks to make the team and they deserve it. as for the third spot, i say give it to michelle. if she's not healthy enough, she'll pull out and there will be an alternate waiting in the wings, just like michelle would have gone to the olympics in '94 if nancy kerrigan hadn't recovered from that whole attacked by tonya's husband's goon thing or if tonya herself had been barred from attending. michelle has brought more joy into my life than any other skater (and skating's a huge deal to me). not the kind of joy that's about happiness but the kind of joy that's about truth.

michelle kwan videos thisaway, including her 2005 bolero and her exhibition performance of fields of gold in the 2002 olympic gala. i'm still hopeful that she'll be in the olympics. but if not, i'm convinced she'll be back for at least one more u.s. nationals and of course her professional skating career at ice shows forever. she's not going out like this. she's been outpaced technically as of late, coming up 4th in last year's world championships under the new scoring system. but that's not what it's about. she's an artist and artists cannot be scored or judged. it's just that sometimes they can get injured and it can hurt more than them when they do.

update:  sasha and kimmie finished 1-2 as predicted. later that night, michelle was picked to join them on the olympic team, with the condition that by january 27th, the selection committee needs to see that she's healed enough from her injury to be a true medal threat. no one deserves that chance more than michelle, and i trust if she's not up to it, she'll bow out and give the olympic berth to 3rd place finisher emily hughes. all is well.

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[electro^plankton]

after watching those videos, especially her performance to TOSCA at the 2004 nationals, I am left with chills. Truly one of - if not the best skaters of all time.