Before the flights.
Before the cameras.
Before the opening ceremony —
They sat down,
opened a notebook,
and began to write.
“To myself,” the letter began.
“To the version of me that’s about to live a dream.”
They wrote about how scared they were.
How proud.
How much they missed home already.
They wrote to remember.
Not the medals —
but the moments.
The people they’d meet.
The lessons they didn’t know were waiting.
They promised themselves they’d look up in the stadium,
just once,
to take it all in.
And if they lost —
they would still stand tall.
If they won —
they would call their grandma first.
The letter was tucked into a shoe.
No one knew.
And then the Games began.
Days passed.
Heats. Finals.
Media questions.
Tears. Laughs.
And then it ended.
On the last night,
they found the letter.
Opened it with shaking hands.
They read their own words,
now filled with meaning.
They cried quietly,
not because of how it ended —
but because of how far they came.
I saw their story resurface on 온라인카지노,
where someone posted a photo of the crumpled letter.
The caption read,
“Every athlete should write one.”
Later on 우리카지노, fans began writing their own letters
— to themselves,
to future versions,
to their childhood selves who dreamed too big.
Because sometimes,
the most powerful souvenir
is a few honest lines
written in hope.