My Sympathies to sports widows
Published:Tuesday | May 24, 2016 | 12:00 AMMelville Cooke
As the professional track and field season cranks up, with the Olympics in Rio looming large, I take this time to commiserate with the sports widows who will find themselves all alone for a few weeks while their significance pales in the eyes of their significant others.
He will be stuck in front of the television at home or, for better or worse, in front of the television at a brethren's home or a sports bar far away from you.
The statistics on various runners will be of immensely more importance than your vital statistics. No matter the proportion of your bust, waist, and hips, he will find the difference in the times and distances from week to week, round to round, much more interesting.
So you can split? Ha! Working out the splits on individual legs required for Jamaica to beat the USA in the men's 4x400-metre race will be of far more relevance. And, frankly, it is highly doubtful that you will cut a better figure than the ladies going into the blocks for the 100m to 400m distances. And then there are the high and triple jumps.
Madre de Dios! (OK, so I needed to say that in Portuguese, but that is as close as I can get right now.)
Normally, this would be a time of some relief for the women whose mates are TV sports junkies, while they would rather have another kind of sweat in their lives much closer to home than the kind the cameras zoom in on, beading some distant athlete's brow. The NBA season, the T20 World Cup, the English Premier league and various European leagues have all hit their peaks.
In a year without a track and field, World Championships, or Olympics, there would be a glimmer of hope - but that comes up only once every four years.
COPING
It would be interesting to see how the women who are not as into sports as their mates cope. I guess there is just so much a woman can do. There are the two extremes - complete disengagement and total immersion. In between are the blends of interest levels, amusement and irritation, while there can also be an agreement to split time. You know, the TV gets this time, while there is a dedicated 'we' time.
If there is any comfort for the women, it is that by September it will all be over. And, for more comfort, you can always get one back on the man in your life by pretending to be fascinated by the action on screen, while you are really taking in the physiques of men who have spent lifetimes honing their bodies to athletic perfection. Judging by how the women squealed for Asafa at the National Stadium during the Jamaica International Invitation, there is a lot of eye candy for them to feast on.
Enjoyment can go more than one way!