Built to Last

What Bloomsday's 50th Anniversary Teaches Us About Plans That Endure

Each year, on the first Sunday of May, something remarkable happens in Spokane that makes it one of Washington's most recognizable communities. Tens of thousands of runners, walkers, families pushing strollers, and veterans of the course who have done this more times than they can count, pour into the streets along the Spokane River and move together through the city. Lilacs are blooming and the air carries that particular Pacific Northwest warmth that makes you forget winter ever happened (until it snows next weekend for no reason). And for a few hours, an entire community participates in something that has been worth showing up for, year after year, for half a century.

This May, the Lilac Bloomsday Run celebrates its 50th anniversary. Since 1977, Spokane's beloved 12K has drawn participants from across the region and the nation, winding them through 7.5 miles of city streets with the Spokane River as their companion and the Monroe Street Bridge as their finish line. More than 1.5 million people have crossed that finish line since the race began. The event has been running for as long as the very first personal computer has been available, outlasted trends, and resisted the kind of cultural restlessness that quietly dismantles most traditions within a generation or two. Bloomsday is still here because the people of the Inland Northwest decided, collectively and repeatedly, that it was worth protecting.

That is a genuinely rare thing. And it raises a question worth sitting with this spring: what else in your life is worth that kind of intentional protection?

Tradition Doesn't Happen by Accident

Bloomsday did not survive 50 years on goodwill alone. Behind every race day is a year's worth of planning revolving around course management, volunteer coordination, community partnerships, and an organizational structure designed to carry the event forward regardless of who holds any single role. The run has survived national crises and unprecedented pandemics, with only a slight adjustment to its schedule on those few occasions. The Lilac Bloomsday Association has stewarded this race with the understanding that, like a river, tradition left unmanaged, erodes. The things we love most require a framework to persist.

Estate planning works on the same principle. The values you hold, the people you love, the assets you have built, and the wishes you carry will not transfer automatically or gracefully without a deliberate plan in place. Most people understand this in the abstract. Far fewer have actually done anything about it during the course of their busy lives. A significant number of those who have taken initial steps are operating on documents that no longer reflect their lives as they actually exist today. Marriages, divorces, new children or grandchildren, business changes, property acquisitions, and shifting social relationships all have the potential to render an older plan not just outdated, but actively problematic.

The river keeps running, but the landscape around it changes. A plan built for the life you had five or ten years ago may not serve the life you have now.

Guidance That Lasts

Imagine deciding to run the race and committing to a single training session before race day, trusting that one good run will carry you through the course whenever you decide to show up — this year, next year, or five years from now. No check-ins, no adjustments, no acknowledgment that your fitness, your schedule, or your goals may have shifted in the meantime. Hopefully, you recognize immediately that this approach would not work. A good training plan requires ongoing attention, someone who understands where you are at any given point, and the flexibility to adapt when circumstances change.

Working with an estate planning attorney to protect your values and assets is no different. The right attorney is not simply someone who drafts your documents and sends you home with a folder or USB drive. They are the trained guide who checks in at each mile marker along the way, hands you what you need to stay on course, and adjusts the plan when the terrain shifts. A marriage is a mile marker. The birth of a child is a mile marker. Starting a business, purchasing property, losing a spouse, or watching your net worth grow substantially; each is a moment when your plan deserves a fresh set of eyes and a practiced hand.

The finish line you set when you were 35 may look considerably different by the time you are 40 or 55. The people you named as beneficiaries, the person you designated to make medical decisions on your behalf, and the structure you put in place for your assets deserve to reflect who you are now, not who you were when you first sat down to think about them. Ongoing attorney guidance ensures that the plan you have is the plan that will actually work when it matters most.

This is not about fear. It is about the same kind of steady, committed stewardship that has kept Bloomsday running for five decades. You show up, you stay engaged, and you trust the people who know the course.

"The finish line you set when you were 35 may look considerably different by the time you are 40 or 55."

What a Complete Plan Actually Looks Like

For those who are newer to estate planning, it helps to understand what a thoughtful, complete plan encompasses. At its foundation, a comprehensive estate plan typically includes a will or a trust. These are the core documents that communicate your wishes and direct where your assets go. A will works through, and engages, the probate process, while a revocable living trust can allow your estate to transfer to your loved ones more privately and efficiently, bypassing probate altogether in many cases. Which structure makes more sense depends on your specific circumstances, and that is precisely the kind of conversation our attorneys are equipped to have with you.

Beyond the foundation, a complete plan addresses the instruments that protect you and your loved ones while you are still living. A financial power of attorney designates someone you trust to manage your financial affairs if you become incapacitated. A healthcare directive, often called a living will or advance directive, communicates your medical wishes when you are unable to speak for yourself, sparing your family the burden of guessing, or worse, blaming. A healthcare power of attorney designates a specific person to make those medical decisions on your behalf.

Beneficiary designations round out the picture. Life insurance policies, retirement accounts, and certain bank accounts transfer by beneficiary designation rather than by will, which means a document you completed decades ago may be directing significant assets in ways you no longer intend. Reviewing and updating these designations is one of the most overlooked and consequential steps in the entire process.

Together, these instruments are the different legs of the course. Each one matters. Skipping one affects the integrity of the whole plan, and unlike a race, there is no opportunity to go back and run a missed section once the moment has passed.

Washington, Your Legacy, and the People Who Cross the Finish Line With You

What makes Bloomsday remarkable is not the distance or the course design. It is the fact that Spokane shows up together. Over 65 percent of the runners from the 2025 event were local Spokane attendees. Families run it in matching shirts and parents who remember running it as children now have the opportunity to bring their own kids to the starting line. Neighbors who barely speak in January find themselves side by side on Riverside Avenue in May, cheering each other toward the river. The race endures because it means something — and what it means has been passed forward, year after year, by people who chose to keep it alive.

Your estate plan is how you do the same for the people you love. It is how you communicate, clearly and legally, what matters to you and how you want the people you care about to be protected. It is the mechanism by which your values and your intentions outlast the limitations of any single moment or conversation. For Washington residents, state-specific laws govern how estates are administered, how certain assets are titled, and how planning instruments must be executed to be valid. Working with our Washingtonian attorneys ensures that your plan is not only thoughtful but enforceable. With the legal landscape changing year after year (hello ‘Washington Millionaires Tax’ and goodbye increased estate tax), you need a local attorney in your corner keeping you in the loop.

At Cornerstone Legal PLLC, we work with individuals and families across Washington who are ready to put a real plan in place, as well as those who need to revisit one that has not been touched in years. Our approach is straightforward: we take the time to understand your life, your goals, and your concerns, and we build a plan that reflects all three. We stay in the conversation as your circumstances evolve, because we understand that a great plan is not a one-time event. It is an ongoing commitment to the people and the things that matter most to you.

The Best Time to Start Is Before the Race Begins

Bloomsday registration opened on January 1st this year. The runners who are best prepared on May 3rd are the ones who started thinking about it long before race day arrived. Estate planning works the same way. The best time to put a plan in place is before you need it, meaning before a health event, a family dispute, or the simple passage of time makes the process more complicated than it needed to be.

This spring, as Spokane celebrates 50 years of showing up for something worth keeping, consider what you want your own legacy to look like. The traditions that endure do so because someone took the time to protect them. Your family, your assets, and your wishes deserve that same kind of care.

We would love to be the team in your corner. Reach out to Cornerstone Legal PLLC by calling our office or filling out the consultation request form on our contact page. The conversation is the first step — and it is a lot easier than the Pettet Drive climb of Doomsday Hill.