I was eager to turn sixteen, because it was one step closer to seventeen—the year I could finally drive myself to the farm. I would no longer have to depend on someone else for a ride. I would no longer have to beg my father for money on the long drives to the farm. I would no longer have to listen to my mother’s endless worries about making ends meet. I would no longer have to ask my sister’s classmate for a ride. I could just be alone. And then I could be at the farm, with my horse, for as long as I wanted.
“So, you’re learning how to drive, huh?” Carol said as I headed out to the parking lot where my father was waiting.
“Yeah, I’m really excited!” I said, smiling.
“Well, normally I’d be worried about having another teenager on the highway, but if you drive like you ride, you’ll be fine,” she said.
“Thanks!” I was uplifted. Carol’s confidence in my driving gave me an even greater sense of confidence.
Things were looking up, my sophomore year was coming to an end, summer was fast approaching, and I was driving. A few months had passed since my grandmother’s death and we had been forced back into our daily routines.
I was especially eager for summer to arrive because it was 1996—a summer Olympic year. Not only that, but the Olympics would be in Georgia! We had driven down to Florida several times when I was younger, so I knew it was a drivable distance. The biggest, most prestigious sporting event would be in my country, within driving distance! I was giddy. By the time May rolled around, I could no longer contain my excitement. All I could talk about was how close the Olympics would be. How my idol, Michelle Gibson, who was from Georgia, would compete for a medal in her home state, and how extraordinarily special that was. It was so poetic—who gets to compete in the world’s greatest athletic event in their own home state? And beyond that, the opportunity was given to Michelle Gibson, a superstar, who worked her way to the top. She deserved to win. I wished I could be there to watch history unfold.
On one of my drives out to the farm with my mother, I said, “Hey Mom, you know the Olympics are going to be in Atlanta this year?”
“So?” she said, disinterested, obviously not sharing in my obsession.
“Well, you know they never televise dressage; wouldn’t it be cool to go see it live since it’s so close?”
“What? You want to go? It’s only two months away! I don’t think we would be able to get tickets now.”
“I know. Just thought it would’ve been cool to go,” I said.
In my lesson that day, I told Carol that the Olympics would be in Atlanta, and she was just as disinterested as my mother.
“Do you know the Olympics are going to be in Atlanta?” I said to her at the end of my lesson.
“Yup,” she responded.
That was it. Just “yup.” Why didn’t anyone care about this monumental event coming so close to home?
__________
School finally let out in the second week of June. My mother picked us up on the last day of school. I was first to the car, so I opened the door to the passenger seat. As I was about to sit, I noticed two airline tickets, and two envelopes with the Olympic logo on them. I picked them up as I sat.
“What’s this?” I asked my mother.
“What you wanted,” she replied.
I tore open the envelopes—inside were tickets to all four of the dressage events!
“Oh my God, Mom! The Olympics!” I whispered. I couldn’t say the word out loud. It was too special.
“How did you even get these? I thought it was impossible.”
“Nothing is impossible if you want it badly enough,” she replied.
I was too elated to be annoyed by her spiritual talk.
“Mom, I don’t even know how to thank you for this. This is a dream come true,” I said, still in shock.
“I know,” she said. After a long pause, she began, “There’s more, though.”
“What?” I said, still looking at the Olympic tickets in my hands.
“Well, you know how I was a jumper rider in Romania?” she started.
“Yeah?”
“Well, in Romania, during the war, it was a different system for equestrians. There were not a dozen barns from which I could choose to ride. There was only one barn, on the army base. Since it was the only barn around Bucharest where everyone could ride, it had both jumper and dressage riders and trainers. The best trainers in my country trained at this army barn,” she said.
“I know, you told me before,” I reminded her, hoping she would cut to the chase.
“Well, one of those trainers was George Theodorescu.”
“No way!” I exclaimed, “You knew George Theodorescu?”
George Theodorescu was an incredibly famous and successful dressage trainer. Not only was he an accomplished rider himself, being an Olympian, but he was also a highly sought after trainer. He had trained hundreds of top riders, including Robert Dover. I had researched and memorized the biographies of almost all of the American, German, and Dutch equestrians, so I knew that most of the riders who had qualified to compete in that year’s Olympics had trained with Mr. Theodorescu.
George Theodorescu had a distinctively Romanian name, but he lived and trained in Germany, where all of the best riders, trainers, and horses were. Germany had won every single individual and team gold medal in dressage in the Olympics since the early 1900s. The Germans dominated the sport, and Americans frequently flocked to Germany to train with the best.
The Theodorescu legacy lived on, after Mr. Theodorescu retired from competition, through his daughter, Monica. She was often featured in the equitation magazines I read. I saw pictures of her magnificent steeds, and read about her success—two World Cup Championships, multiple Olympic Team gold medals, and several individual Olympic silver and bronze medals.
I was astounded when my mother announced that she knew this dressage icon.
“Yes, I knew him. I mean, not well, since I was just another kid who did jumping, and he was this elegant, sophisticated dressage trainer, but we would say ‘hello’ in passing,” she continued. “Anyway, after World War II, during one of his international competitions, he escaped communist Romania and fled to Germany. He left everything behind—his home, his friends, and his horses,” I sensed her tormented nostalgia from reminiscing about her youth in Romania—her home and her prison.
“So he has been living in Germany ever since then, and now his daughter is also an Olympian,” she continued.
I scoffed, “Yeah, Mom, I know. Monica Theodorescu.”
“Yes, well Mr. Theodorescu goes with her to all of her Olympics, of course, and this year he is also the team coach for the French dressage team.”
“So?” I wondered where this was all leading.
After a long pause, she said, “I have arranged for you to meet him in Atlanta,” she concluded.
No WAY! I thought. I was screaming in my head. A hurricane of excitement and disbelief rushed over me. I was dumbfounded. It was as if I had just been handed the impossible on a silver platter. Just as I was about to shriek with glee, she added, “The only catch is I can’t be there for the whole week because I have to work and take care of the dogs and your sister,” she stated. “I will be there the first couple of days, but your father will be there the whole time.”
“Oh, Mom!” I whined.
“Enough!” she interrupted. “He is your father, and he loves you.”
“But he’s such an asshole!”
“You are the only person in the world he actually likes; you’ll be fine.”
I sat back and remained quiet. Who cares who I’m going to be there with? I’m going to see the Olympics! And meet George Theodorescu! I thought.
I couldn’t wait to tell Carol.
The next day, when I saw her in the barn, I rushed to her and gushed, “Carol, guess what? I’m going to see the Olympics in Atlanta!”
“That’s great, Victoria! It will be good for you to see the superstars live. I want a full report when you get back.”
“You got it!” I said through my wide smile.