America's Golden Boy

Sometimes you go along doing your jobs, and nothing special ever happens. Other times you go along, doing your jobs, and you happen to be in the right place at the right time for something amazing to come your way. Today I was minding my business in the KJZZ kitchen getting ready for my monthly TV segment, when this unassuming guy walked in and asked me what I was cooking. We chatted for a minute and when I asked him his name, he said, "I'm Billy." I had heard the Olympics mentioned and asked him if he had just come back from Vancouver. He nodded and someone said, "He's a gold medalist!" Well, didn't I feel about two inches high. I'd been chatting with Billy Demong, gold and silver medalist in the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics. He immediately pulled out his medals and let me hold them. No pretenses, no posturing, he just pulled them out and let me hold them. I had a moment of pride I've never felt before, being able to touch Olympic gold won by someone who represented USA in one of the toughest sports out there. And Billy Demong is about the nicest guy I have ever met. He was so down-to-earth and real, it was almost unreal. You expect someone who has achieved something like that to be walking around with an ego inflated to the size of Soldier Field, but Billy was about as regular as you get. He was genuinely interested in what I was doing and took the time to talk to everyone who wanted to talk to him. He took this picture of me in the kitchen to upload onto his Twitter page, and also because he "really liked the kitchen and was going to re-do" his own kitchen and needed an inspiration shot. In case you missed him at the Olympics this year, Billy was the first American ever to win gold in the individual combined Nordic skiing event, which is a hybrid sport of both ski jumping and cross-country skiing, and also won a silver in the team competition. He also carried the flag for Team USA in the closing ceremonies. All this came after competing in four Olympic games. Four! So much work, so much time, for a life lived in pursuit of a dream. But isn't that who we all are, deep down? He has said that he thinks "American athletes are just like anybody else. We work real hard for a real long time to earn the victories." That translates to the rest of us, I think. We all work hard. We all do the best we can with what we've got. For celiacs, we do the best we can with what we can eat, and try every day to keep a positive attitude about how we eat and invest in our health victories. That's what it's all about, isn't it? That and meeting America's Golden Boy while doing my jobs.

Happy eating!