When I retired from the Australian Senate in 2005, I received a letter of thanks for my service from a man who had watched me run in an athletics race on the NSW south coast 54 years earlier.
What had caught the track crowd's attention as I took part in the race in 1951 was the calliper strapped onto my left polio-affected leg. This device wasn't light titanium steel but railway track grade iron.
He wrote: "you came a very bad last in the five-year-old '100-yard dash,' but first in the hearts of all those who watched".
I was awarded a plain yellow ribbon - for having a go. But, even then, as a polio survivor, I realised the cards life had dealt me meant Olympic gold was not in my future stars.
There was a glimmer of hope for my 16-year-old brother. In the NSW state athletic championships, Jeff was a placegetter. He was chosen to carry the Olympic torch for a 'one-mile' section, in the Southern Highlands, on the road to the Melbourne Olympics in 1956.
Before the event, mum gave him bacon and eggs for breakfast. During his run, the burning torch fumes made him throw up. This created headlines, with this 'dramatic' episode, widely reported. "Ill on torch run: student keeps it burning."
In that year, TV had arrived in Australia, and the Games were televised. Most of the population did not have a TV, including my family.
Often, we would go down to the local electrical retailer and watch the Games through the store window on a small and grainy black and white TV.
What a contrast to Tokyo in 2021. The magic of digital ultra-high-definition television is now on full display, with muscle ripples and splash droplets captured graphically in UHD slow motion.
When the IOC announced the Games would go ahead in the middle of Japan's latest COVID pandemic wave, my reaction was one of disbelief.
Even though there would be no spectators, the risk of the highly contagious Delta strand spreading through the athlete's village is still a real and present danger.
At our place initially, there was no interest in this sports fest. We didn't watch the opening ceremony and ignored the coverage.
But then, irresistibly, we were drawn in by a growing excitement in news bulletins, reporting the brilliance of Australia's outstanding athletes.
Who will ever forget the performances of our swimming golden girls Emma McKeon and Ariarne Titmus? And we will all remember the reaction of Ariarne's coach!
They will now have their image on an Australian postage stamp, as each Australian gold medallist will be honoured in this way.
Australia, again, is punching above our weight.
To put this in perspective, Australia was vying with Russia for the fourth/fifth position out of 206 competing countries at the end of the first week. The USA, China and Japan occupy the first three places above us. Not only are they the three biggest economies in the world, but their teams are drawn from populations between five and 58 times the size of our own.
We have come a long way from the humiliation of the Montreal Olympics in 1976, where our medal 'haul' was four bronze, one silver and no gold.
The Fraser government was so embarrassed that it established and funded the Australian Institute of Sport, dedicated to the training of our elite athletes. Since Montreal, Australia's performance has recovered dramatically with Tokyo becoming our best Olympic Games ever.
We certainly need such jubilation and excitement in the middle of the depressing and monotonous COVID lockdowns.
Unfortunately, the Olympic Games, together with other elite sports, send mixed messages to our youth.
What is important in sport and other endeavours is to participate and do your best.
The Olympic ideal is participation. Following his event in Tokyo, when he didn't win a medal, Newcastle triathlete Aaron Royle said: "I wish I could have done more, but I did the best I could." Great attitude.
But, in Tokyo, what only seems to matter is winning gold.
Do you remember the look of utter disappointment on the faces of one of our swimming relay teams as they only took out the bronze medal? Only the bronze? They are Olympians, finalists and medal winners - the third-best in the world.
There is much to be celebrated.
But the result did not seem to be good enough for the commentators, the sports community, and even the bronze medallists themselves.
The Olympic ideal was best expressed by Australian flag-bearer Cate Campbell who received her second individual medal - a bronze - at her fourth Olympics. She said: "it honestly means the world to me." That's the spirit.
