Special Moment

At the Special Olympics! Rachel's sister sharing the exciting moment after Rachel received her gold medal in the 25 meter backstroke competition against seven other swimmers! I took lots of actual competition pictures at the games because I wanted to enter them in the Momentum competition but this one grabbed my heart. Rachel took a silver medal in her free style competition and surprised us all when she made a perfect dive to start. Her coach has never practiced diving and most of the competitors don't dive. We had asked her last week if she ever felt like trying it and she said "No way!" We were in the audience saying, "What is she doing?" My heart was in my throat because I was afraid she would be too scared at the end and freeze. I could see her legs shaking from up in the stands. Then she dove (and we didn't get the picture) Her very ladylike sister yelled "Holy Crap! she dove" and received several dirty looks. It was a perfect dive and we have no idea where it came from. She said she wanted to surprise us! SHE DID!

I have always told her that people who are not afraid are not the bravest people. The people who are scared of things and do them in spite of their fear are the bravest. She is my hero!