Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Oh, Thirty..


I have been putting this post off for the past few weeks. It is supposed to be a post wherein I reflect upon the past 30 years. Except that I can't decide which angle to take: witty, insightful, deep and meaningful, bullshit....you get the idea.
To sum up 30 years with one angle is possible, but I am pretty sure it wouldn't do them (er, my life so far) much justice. Oh, did I forget to say that I turned 30 last week? That would be a helpful explanation, eh?

I have a list of things I wanted to do before I turned 30. I have only done one of them. I'm okay with that. The list is now titled "Things I Want To Do Before I Have Kids." (which, for anyone who cares/keeps asking, won't be for a few more years thankyouverymuch).

It doesn't feel much different, 30. To be honest, I kind of expected more fanfare. Or that I would wake up and be horrified by all of the wrinkles that had appeared overnight. I expected to FEEL different, or look different. That people would just KNOW I was 30. But none of that happened. Someone actually thought I was lying when I told them I was 30. (I'm hoping this keeps happening. It's good for my self esteem).

Andrew got me this really sweet birthday card that read: "How old would you be if you didn't know how old you are?"
"That's easy," I say. "25!" (the ironic part is that I've been telling people I'm 25 for the past 5 years and yet, I don't really actually remember much about being 25. It was a very dark/drunk year).
I didn't particularly love being 25. It's just how old I FEEL. And, although my life has changed in many, many ways since then, its how old I still feel. (Except my knees. But they have always felt older than me. Even when I was 20.)

I wish I had more to say about being 30, but it feels the same as 29. And 28.

I will sum it all up by saying that in the past 30 years, I have: grown, changed, adapted, moved, learned, loved, sang, fallen, ran, flexed, cried, laughed, tripped, lost, won, jumped, given, received, pushed, bent, turned, stretched, matured and lived.

You get the idea.

2 comments:

Sarah said...

Well done. Happy, happy birthday!

Birthdays are birthdays. It's usually the stuff that happens in between birthdays that are the milestones, though, right? Celebrations and mournings?

I thought 30 would be a big birthday. I woke up with the kind of stomach virus that just shouldn't happen in America.

Jill said...

Hey, happy birthday! I hope you had a fantastic celebration. At 28-almost-29, I keep forgetting how old I am. I figure this will continue once I'm 30. I, too, would be perpetually 25 if possible. It's a good age.

I remember being distressed to turn 26, largely because as a youth envisioning my future, I'd never pictured myself past the early twenties. But, the days, they keep passing, and that's all right.