The athletic front gave me my first push, because it is brand-new. Until this year I had an athletic résumé that looked something like this: “Cheerleader, Junior High School (freckles, smile, and energy as driving forces); Volleyball team, eighth grade; and Pandas swim team (small Catholic school, every one made every team).” Until last year, I had never run a mile. I swam two laps and was breathless. I liked to cycle, but that was with a Burley, going a 5-miles-per-hour pace and stopping every half-mile to serve up a Sippy Cup to one of my kids.

I walked a mean double stroller and occasionally swam at the YMCA . . . as many laps as I could (breaststroke so as not to get my hair wet) before the volunteers raced into the pool to tell me one of my kids was crying hysterically in the nursery and it was time for this aspiring get-the-baby-fat- off mom-athlete to pack her bag and go home. On the day of the triathlon, just two weeks after my fiftieth birthday, I crossed the finish line knowing it was a day of triumph.

The day really was about facing fears of illness, grief, and carrying on when I wanted to give up out of exhaustion, stress, and the uncertainty of what lies ahead. The finish line for all of us is never clearly in sight, but we keep pushing to get there, up the steep hills and through the murky waters. You know you can’t give up. And you don’t.

A few days before the event, I found a card. It was a picture of a swimmer  —  bathing cap and all  —  about to dive in.

Be not the slave of your own past  —  plunge into the sublime seas, dive deep and swim far, so you shall