Ice On Fire

In late 1985, the  Cold War was simultaneously the hottest it had ever been AND it was at the same time obviously thawing. One of the most popular pop music acts of the era released an album that to this day still has a special place to me and has one of my Top Ten Of All Time songs. I was twenty-two years old, and the previous winter (1984) I had fallen head over heels in love with a girl that would never know that I was alive. Representing East Germany at the 1984/88 Winter Games, she danced across the ice on fire. I know - without any doubt - that I am not the only man who holds her in a special place in the heart of our youth. She became a symbol of the idea that the world could get along and could find a way to end the conflict. Her final Olympic skate, in Lillehammer in 1984, was one of - if not the - definition of grace and beauty and the Olympic ideal. When she retired, there was no more loved skater than Katarina Witt, now of just Germany. So when she speaks out on something, even all these years later, that ice melts and the fire dims. I listen to what she says and understand that she has a far greater appreciation of what happened than I ever will.