Earlier this year, I turned 30.  My entire life, even right up until I turned 30, I thought 30 was old.  There were times when I felt old, but 30 has always meant officially old.  There are things you just can’t (well, shouldn’t) get away with anymore when you are 30.  30 means responsibility.  Retirement savings.  Financial planning.  The occasional bodily ailment.  The more than occasional gray hair.  Minivans and selflessly cleaning up other people’s messes. Needless to say, I had been dreading 30 ever since I realized that I wasn’t going to be young forever.

30 came.  30 went.  We had a great little get-together with some family and close friends.  I waited for reality to set in.  I gave it about 10 minutes’ thought and came to a realization (and breathed a contented sigh of relief).

I took a little inventory of my life at age 30 and guess what?  It’s not so bad.  If we’re all so lucky, we will all turn 30 and 40 and so on, so why get bent out of shape about getting older?  Of course we are going to get older, and really, do we want to be stuck in time?  Life moves on, and so do we.  So I’m happy to be able to reach 30 and have my health.  I gave birth to the most beautiful little baby boy 2 months before my 30th birthday and I could not ask for more than everything he is in a baby.  He has added so much more joy to my life.  I have a husband that I adore, even if we don’t get to spend as much time together as we’d like.  We don’t live paycheck to paycheck.  We share a cute and modest home that we are proud to own (or are in the process of owning) and have improved little by little with our own hands (and the help of a few other hands).  I have graduated from college, which is one of my proudest personal achievements.  I feel loved equally by my family of origin as I do by the family I have married into.  I have the most sincere and wonderful friends I’ve ever had in my life.  None of these things make my life especially remarkable or extraordinary, but they are the little accomplishments that carry me through time from one day to the next, one week to the next, and one year to the next, with a smile on my face and contentment in my soul.

Maybe if my inventory experiment left me feeling empty, I’d take the time to pity myself for turning 30.  But when I step back and take a look at my life, I’m happy.  Sure, there are things I would change here and there, but when push comes to shove, I have everything I need.  Bring on the (occasional) gray hair, the (few and far between) wrinkles, and (extra) candles on the cake because I’m 30.  And I can definitely rock 30.

~C~