Hummingbirds Return and Yardwork

Every year the hummingbirds return with their high-pitched trills and iridescent wings blurring into invisibility. I delight in watching them dive-bomb the flowering crabapple trees, then swoop over tulips and daffodils thrust up through warming soil. Buds swell on bare branches, days stretch longer, light lingers past dinner. What I don't savor is the overwhelming assault of yard cleanup: restoring mulch that's scattered or decomposed, raking tons of rusty pine needles, coaxing the drip irrigation back to life, praying for perennials to emerge after a punishing dry winter.

When Rob and I bought this house nearly twenty-two years ago, the previous owners had just re-landscaped the backyard. The shrubs stood trim and compact, rose bushes exploded in crimson blooms, mulch nestled obediently inside crisp brick boundaries. We installed a swing set and sandbox and tried to keep pace with the seasons' demands, but with three small children pulling us in every direction, we surrendered ground each year. After a decade in the house, the backyard had morphed into something from The Secret Garden—rose bushes erupting in thorny chaos before dying back, grass invading the margins, mulch vanishing into soil.

After abandoning hope of restoration—despite one ambitious swap of swing set for trampoline—we hired Aden and her college friend to resurrect some semblance of order in the areas nearest the house. We celebrated when brick borders reemerged from their grassy graves, when rocks in the landscaping beat back the encroaching turf. Inspired, we hired another crew to tackle the perimeter. Though we've lost the rose bushes and several cottonwood trees to drought and neglect, our yard now somewhat echoes its former glory.

Only somewhat because we live in drought, and without moisture to revive the bluegrass, our pine trees and their gnarled, serpentine roots have conquered the lawn. We're allowed to water just two days per week—Wednesday and Saturday—and I'm eyeing xeriscaping for the backyard like we installed in front: less water demanded, less maintenance required, native plants and stone where Kentucky bluegrass once thrived. For now, the looming task of yard restoration has lifted. I can hear the shrill territorial call of the hummingbird without my blood pressure spiking in response.

Bring on summer—but hopefully with afternoon thunderstorms rolling in from the mountains, rain drumming on the deck and soaking deep into our thirsty soil. The hummingbirds will dart between raindrops. The perennials will drink. And I'll watch from the kitchen window, grateful that for once, someone else is doing the watering.

Masters Nationals Recap

 The crush of swimmers in Friday's warmup pool sent us searching all twenty lanes for an opening. Before jumping in, we ran into Rocky Mountain teammates who warned us about the slippery metal facing on the far walls—already responsible for slips on the 400 free relay. Aden and I raised our eyebrows at each other, then plunged into the waves to test the competition pool, our sleep-deprived haze broken by near-panic.

Aden's 100 breast came first. Already wedged into her new tech suit, she fired off her best time in four years. After a loop through the cool-down pool, Aden and my friend Ellen joined me in the locker room to wrestle me into my own new suit—brick red material so small it seemed impossible it would clear my knees, let alone rise over my rear and hips. Somehow, with a woman on either side hiking the fabric over the Crisco-style spray I'd lubed with, they lifted me at the hips until I hung suspended like a puppet on strings, the suit inching upward.

After adjusting the suit again in warmup, I raced my 50 fly and came close to my goal time, earning second place and posting what currently ranks second in the country for my age group. Disappointed in missing the mark, I threw everything into the 100 free, where altitude training helped me push through the back half to a time I haven't seen in seven years. A talented swimmer from Wisconsin Masters who'd been in several of my races grasped my hand at the finish. I lifted both our hands skyward—relief and joy pouring through me.

The community of swimmers and families sustained and astonished us over three days. Rob and William made the flight to Greensboro to cheer us on, their voices rising above the din each time Aden or I stepped onto the blocks—a reminder that the best support comes from those who watched us overcome every moment of doubt. I encountered a former Harvard teammate and classmate from New England who recognized me despite thirty-four intervening years and a name change. Aden and I rubbed shoulders with former Cal star Reece Whitley. Eight-time Olympic gold medalist Jenny Thompson anchored the relay next to ours in the 45+ mixed free competition.

Even more poignant than the Olympians were encounters with new friends waiting poolside between races. I met a remarkable woman from Idaho in remission from aggressive melanoma. She'd survived brutal treatment over the past few years and lost sight in one eye, but that didn't stop her from climbing the blocks, throwing herself at turns on those treacherous slippery walls, racing to strong times.

The indefatigable human spirit blazed everywhere—ninety-seven-year-olds competing and setting records to the astonishment and delight of 2,000+ athletes and spectators. My personal highlight came in the women's 55+ medley relay, swimming fly and hitting 28.3—surpassing my fourteen-year-old mark by one-tenth of a second. It's not a legal time because I jumped in after anticipating the breaststroker's touch rather than starting from the gun, but I accept the gift from my former self. Next time, I'll do it in the actual race.

What the water teaches: that community matters more than individual times, that courage looks like a woman racing half-blind on unfamiliar walls, that ninety-seven-year-olds can still set records, that two friends can literally lift you into a suit you couldn't manage alone. The relationships forged poolside—the hand grasped at the finish, the warning about slippery walls, the recognition across decades—these prove more rewarding than any clock ever could.

With inspiration drawn from the Masters swimming community and my family, what else is there but to start planning for Irvine next year? The water will be there, waiting. So will the community. And so, I hope, will I—perhaps a tenth of a second faster, certainly grateful for every moment spent in the company of people who understand why we keep diving in.

Channeling Fourteen

Yesterday at Masters practice, one of my dear friends—also preparing for Nationals—asked if I was "freaking out yet." I laughed and said yes, but that I was slamming the door on the nerves because I don't have time for them. The truth is riskier than it sounds: disrupting the workout schedule, even to rest, unsettles bodies that prefer predictable routines to abrupt change. My friends and I hope the reward comes in faster swims, but there are no guarantees. We're all rolling the dice.

My first event is the 50-yard fly, and I'm chasing a time under 29 seconds for the first time in years. I recall racing the event at thirteen or fourteen in the Natick, Massachusetts town pond, representing my town of Medfield, where we also practiced in an oozy, shallow, algae-coated body of water that would horrify modern health inspectors.

I was shaking with nerves, matched against a well-known swimmer in my age group, a girl who excelled at fly. How they started us remains a mystery—it wasn't an electronic timing system!—but I remember diving off a slippery dock into murky waters of unknown depth, sprinting for my life. I wanted to beat this formidable opponent, who would become my college teammate five years later.

The race ended in my narrow victory. I don't even recall adults timing us, though they must have been swaying on those docks, struggling to hold their balance and stopwatches as we powered between thin white nylon ropes marked periodically with blue buoys. On the many-times-folded paper where I recorded all my times from ages thirteen to eighteen, I noted the result: 28.47. Won. I remember my opponent looking over at me—the unknown quantity—in surprise, hearing her ask people later, "Who was that girl?"

So I'm channeling my skinny, raw, untutored self, ready to launch off fancy starting blocks in one of the fastest pools in the country, wearing an expensive tech suit and hoping my decades of experience offset my decades of wear. My body has endured considerable trauma in the intervening forty years—two pregnancies and births, overtraining syndrome, autoimmune breakdowns, nutrient deficiencies, the relentless accumulation of miles and years. But I'm stronger now than I've ever been, fortified by knowledge and intention.

I'm excited to roll the dice and discover whether I can make fourteen-year-old Laura proud—that girl who dove into murky pond water without hesitation, who wanted victory badly enough to shake with nerves and sprint anyway. She didn't know about periodization or tapers, tech suits or underwater streamlines. She just knew how to race. Maybe that raw hunger still lives somewhere in these older bones, waiting for the starting beep to call it forward.

Racing Toward Something

In nine days I leave for Greensboro, North Carolina, to compete in US Masters National Championships. Aden will race alongside me while Rob and William compose our cheering section and driving team. From Denver to Greensboro we fly over 1,400 miles and, more problematic, two time zones. Prepping for 6:30 a.m. warmup and an 8:00 a.m. meet start on the East Coast has required rolling my alarm back from 7:00 to 5:30 here in Denver, a shift my body resents with every fiber.

Each morning I drag myself from bed to silence the alarm before it pulls Rob beyond his going-back-to-sleep threshold, trying to convince myself this adjustment matters—that acclimating somewhat to Eastern time before competing will make a difference. After six months of demanding training in the gym and pool, I refuse to let sleep deprivation or jet lag compromise my events on day one.

This morning I sprawled on the TV room floor wrapped in the purple afghan Aden made for me, struggling through PT exercises for hips and back, wondering if more sleep would serve me better than this forced adjustment. Rob thinks rest trumps everything, but I have nightmares of flopping in my 50 fly—first event on the first day—because my creaky joints, foggy brain, and fast-twitch muscles are still sleeping while I'm supposed to be racing.

Here's what I know: with all the weighty troubles splashed across headlines these sunny spring mornings, a swim meet represents nothing more consequential than a family reunion and a chance to test whether short, fast reps and heavier weights have actually made me faster. I'm chasing my fastest Masters times, or at least my fastest in a decade, despite the betrayal of aging. The pursuit feels simultaneously urgent and absurd—serious enough to warrant 5:30 a.m. alarms yet trivial against the backdrop of global crisis.

But perhaps that's the point. We need these pockets of meaning we can control, these small arenas where effort translates to measurable outcome. We need family road trips and the particular nervousness that comes before stepping onto the blocks. We need to care about small things while the world burns, not as escape but as tether—proof that ordinary life persists, that we can still chase personal goals while holding awareness of larger suffering.

At least the early wake-ups gift me extra morning hours for writing, cleaning, PT, and planning—small victories that accumulate like training yards in the pool. And possibly a nap after lunch, which at my age might be the real competitive advantage. In nine days I'll stand behind the blocks in Greensboro, William and Rob somewhere in the stands, Aden in her own race nearby. The alarm will have done its work. The training will speak for itself. And for a few days, we'll inhabit that strange space where something as inconsequential as a swim race feels like the most important thing in the world—because we've decided it matters, and that decision alone is enough.

Eucatastrophe

"Joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief." — J.R.R. Tolkien, "On Fairy-Stories"

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I'm reading a book called An Academic Affair: A Novel, in which two protagonists hold PhDs in literary studies. One character, Sadie, wrote her dissertation on "eucatastrophe"—a term coined by J.R.R. Tolkien in his essay "On Fairy-Stories." The word, meaning "good catastrophe," stuck to me like a linty sock on a wool sweater, resonating with memories of last week when Rob's sudden heart procedure transformed from horrible stressor to miraculous saving grace.

The book's author, Jodi McAlister, uses a scene from the Anne of Green Gables series to illustrate eucatastrophe, cementing my attraction to both her novel and the concept—I wrote my undergraduate honors thesis on the works of L.M. Montgomery, who created Anne, one of my favorite heroines. The scene McAlister invokes comes from the third book, when Gilbert Blythe lies dying of typhoid fever and Anne realizes, in her terror of losing him, that she loves him. The next morning, a hired hand brings news that Gilbert survived, that his fever broke in the night. In that moment of joyous illumination, Anne experiences her eucatastrophe—the sudden turn from despair to deliverance.

The term calls to me in this moment of wars, escalating conflict, and apocalyptic rhetoric. The world needs a sudden miraculous turn of events that saves our heroes—in this case, all of us—from impending gloom. We need what Tolkien describes as that "piercing glimpse of joy," the shift from despair to victory that arrives when hope seems lost.

At Easter service, Rev. Mark explored John 20:1, which describes Mary Magdalene going to Jesus' tomb "while it was still dark." He selected the word "while" to turn over and examine. While bad things unfold, good is at work, God is at work, he explained. Life doesn't proceed as one concrete event after another—the next phase forms while the previous phase unravels, running concurrent rather than consecutive.

I hold onto this truth: that good things may be unfolding while war crises stutter forward, that the world might yet experience its eucatastrophe. People might yet find joy, breathe deeply, shift focus toward what heals rather than what wounds. Meanwhile, I remain grateful for our moment of miraculous deliverance and try to send its positive energy outward. Sometimes the fever breaks. Sometimes the stent opens the artery. Sometimes the catastrophe becomes good, and the darkness discovers it was never absolute after all.