It happened the other night, when Joannie Rochette stepped onto the ice just four days after her mother’s death, and uplifted the hearts of the world:

At the end of her medal-winning skate, Joannie Rochette threw back her head and blew a kiss to the heavens.

That was for you, mom.

Four days after her mother’s death, Rochette won the women’s figure skating bronze Thursday night. It felt like gold to everyone who saw her skate — to the hundreds, thousands, perhaps even millions around the world for whom the Vancouver Olympics will always be remembered, in part, for Rochette’s courage.

Her mother, who used to drive her to skating practice as a kid, died Sunday of a heart attack just a few hours after arriving in Vancouver to watch her daughter’s crowning moment, competing as a medal favorite at the Winter Games on home soil. Therese Rochette was 55.

“It was six in the morning when I heard the news,” the 24-year-old Rochette said, speaking publicly for the first time about her loss. “I couldn’t really believe it. They took me to the hospital to see mom’s body. I was able to say my goodbyes.”

She skated in practice that afternoon, dressed in black, wiping her eyes and taking a deep breath before stepping on the ice.

“There were moments when I said to myself, ‘I really don’t want to do this. I want to take the first plane, go home, see my grandparents, my family.’ But I said to myself that in 10 years time, when I would think about all of this and when my mourning would be over, I would probably have wished that I had skated here,” she said.

“That was the way that mom raised me, to be faithful to the person that she made of me, to make her proud.”

That is life, isn’t it? We grow, we learn, we leap, and we land as best we can.  We go on, with faith and with grace, to honor what we know, and to remember those we love.  Joannie Rochette showed us how it’s done.