It's not a milestone of a birthday and I'm not that upset about it. It will just be a change for me, a new era, if you will. Friday I turn thirty-one. Friday I will no longer be "thirty, flirty, and thriving. Friday will mean I am officially in my thirties.
This is okay. I can handle it. For one: sometimes I think I look like a twelve-year-old boy. I think it's my hair and my love of silly t-shirts. I'm okay with that. Just yesterday I was complimented by the cashier at Total Wine when I showed her my ID she said "Wow, I didn't think you were that old". Thank you, cashier who was probably barely old enough to sell me the six tiny bottles of vodka I needed to make my Cosmo Pops (recipe here). That's the kind of thing that doesn't make getting old seem so bad.
Of course, there are things, like an article shaming people for reading Young Adult novels (how rude) that make me feel guilty for getting older. Yeah, guilty for reading and enjoying what I read. (I do what I want, lady.)
Here's the thing: I don't act old because I don't feel old. Yeah, sometimes my joints hurt, I need more sleep than I used to, and I don't party the same way...but I've got a young heart, you see. Just last night at praise band rehearsal we were talking about age and one of my friends said to the other (not to me) "I'd never guess you were that old because you don't act your age". It's a compliment, if you ask me, when someone says that. But at the same time, how am I supposed to act at my age?
How does anyone know when we're all so damn different?
Two of my favorite television shows are Friends and How I Met Your Mother. Both of these shows are about thirty-somethings living in New York City. It showcases all their relationships, their job struggles, and their extra-curricular activities. In Friends the majority of the "hanging out" happens in a Central Perk, the coffee shop. Where as in HIMYM they are always at McClaren's, the bar downstairs.
If I based my "acting my age" on these two shows that people in my generation actually grew up with I'd split my time between being totally wasted and too strung out on caffeine to function!
When my mother was my age she was looking to have her second child and I was ten years old. When my Mema was my age she had just had my mother, her fourth daughter! Here I am going to be thirty-one and contemplating which book I'm going to read next or which television show I'm going to binge on this week.
I can't act my age, because I don't know how. I don't know how my age is supposed to act! Wine tastings? Art galleries? Silent movies? (Snoozefest 2014 if you ask me. I'll be going to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter for my birthday!)
All I know is how to be me.
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| My recent binge on Veronica Mars made me feel this was a necessity. |
The me I am will be enjoying life in my thirties with people of all ages, who help keep me grounded and make me feel young, but most of all make me smile.
I hope you don't "act your age", either.
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