Had a good early morning practice with Lori today. We did some pretend elimination rounds that could have gone better, but I was half asleep and had to push harder than usual to focus. After much rest, ice, and Reiki, the pains in my back and forearm have diminished, and not a moment too soon. I shot about 40 arrows yesterday, filming most of it to make sure my shoulder wasn’t coming up. (I might toss a couple of the videos up on YouTube for posterity, for those who are interested.) My form looks great overall, and there’s not a thing about it I would change if I could. Guess all that hard work paid off. ;)

I wonder how many hundreds of thousands of arrows I’ve shot in my archery career. I had a surreal deja-vu moment today, as I punched my arrow counter into the 90s, and all of a sudden it was as if I could feel the muscle memory of every arrow I’ve shot since Athens. I have shot SO MUCH, practice after practice, going and going and going. Many of those shots were good, some were bad. Many were so hard to shoot that it brought me to tears, and some were so easy that it felt like I was born to shoot arrows. But the ones that count the most are the arrows I’ve been shooting in this month, with the confidence that came with the revelation in Colorado. I trust myself now, implicitly. Do you know the kind of freedom that comes with being able to trust yourself? I can’t tell you how ready I feel now.

It’s funny, this time four years ago I was getting my braces removed, listening to Ace of Base, and worrying about drama within the team. I was preparing for an archery camp at the California OTC and a weekend in LA with my wonderful coach Don Rabska, the only person on the planet who I still would trust implicitly when it comes to tuning a bow perfectly on the first try. It gives me a warm feeling to know that after four years, he’s still my personal coach—-even if I haven’t visited him since last summer. What an amazing guy. It was cool to see him working with 5-time Olympian Butch Johnson in Beijing. How old is Butch now? Early fifties? If I've shot hundreds of thousands of arrows, surely he's shot millions.

Age is a funny thing, especially in sports. I think people assume that once you hit your early to mid twenties, you finish with school, settle into a job, stop learning, stop growing, stop changing. I’m 23 and I still feel in limbo, but I’m so much more settled and in control of myself than I was at 19. Still, perspective is everything. At that age, I was looking at the 12-yr old Paralympic swimmers at the OTC and marveling at their youth. Perhaps maturity really is just relative. I don’t even remember this scene, but it was in my personal blog from August 28, 2004:

"There are over 60 Paralympic Swimmers [here at the Olympic Training Center preparing for Athens], and over half of them are under 18. Last night the dining hall was so packed that a few of the youngest had to eat with us archers. One girl, a perky little amputee (her tray contained, of all things, a bowl of fruit loops, some spaghetti, the seafood pesto surprise, and a big glass of pink lemonade) introduced herself as ‘Hi, I'm twelve!’ I told her it was nice to meet her, after which all her friends laughed (high-pitched giggles, oh the horror) and then told me her name was Jessica. I checked the OTC Newsletter later on and discovered she's a major Gold Medal contender.

"Twelve! My God! It sounded so incredibly weird to hear these little kids talking about how this was their first Olympics--they said it like it was their first school dance, or their first real live rock concert. On the one hand, I know they've worked incredibly hard. It's rather obvious, considering how fit everyone on the team looks, even the quadriplegics. But it's still weird to think of these little girls going to compete in the 2nd biggest sporting event in the world--the 2nd biggest event, of any kind, on the planet! It seems unfair to them, somehow, that they don't seem old enough to really appreciate it.

"But hell. They've earned it, and maybe when they're older they'll look back, and they will be able to appreciate it. Maybe they'll go on to coach other giggly little gimps to the Paralympics or the Olympics. It's just surreal, is all."

Surreal? Amen to that! I'm sitting here wondering if I was old enough to really appreciate my first Games. Talk about a day for deja-vu...

Nihao, everyone! I’d like to welcome you to the Beijing blog of two-time Paralympic Archer, Lindsey Carmichael. I’m going to be updating you on my practices, training, and preparation for the upcoming 2008 Paralympic Games in Beijing. I kept a private blog when I competed in Athens in 2004, and even though I’m glad I kept a record of my thoughts, in retrospect I wish I’d been able to share them with my friends and family more easily.

So here we are, my brand-new blog for Beijing. I took a poll of my friends in a search for blog titles, and one brilliant soul came up with the name “Rings and Arrows” which is a play off a line from Hamlet’s famous soliloquy from Act III, Scene I:

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?

I have faced a sea of troubles to get where I am today. I would say that it took a miracle to get me on the Team, but in reality I know exactly what it took—tremendous willpower, determination, tears, pain, faith, trust, and most importantly, hard work. In a way, outrageous fortune has smiled on me at last, and I feel as if I am on top of the world.

I suppose before I get too carried away I ought to give you a proper introduction and let you in on the secret of why it was so hard for me to make the Team this year. My name is Lindsey Carmichael, ( and I’ve been shooting archery since 8th grade... )

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Thanks for reading, everyone! I'll have more updates for you, soon! :)

"Life only demands from you the strength you possess. Only one feat is possible: not to have run away."

--Dag Hammarskjöld, Swedish diplomat