I’m twenty nine. At least I can say that truthfully for a few more days. I feel like I’ve been yanked from my life at the speed of light and have been placed into the witness protection program without even getting to say my sappy goodbyes or give kisses and hugs to the ones I love. Gosh, sometimes life is so strict. I’m bound for this scary and dramatic new destination. I don’t know anything about it and I’m being drawn to it with the force of a magnetic field even though I’d rather fight it. Thirty is a dirty word.
Last night I counted up how many days I have left in my beloved (albeit tumultuous) twenties. Unfortunately, my almost thirty year old brain already forgot. Tick-tock goes the clock and I’m standing in my red stilettos watching the second hand as it turns in a perfect circle while everything is buzzing around it. It’s quite movie-esque. Everything in the room is white and sterile except for the blur of people in black and subsequent shade of gray going by so fast that I can’t make out any faces. I’m in black too, of course. Hello…I’m in mourning. Maybe I have a new accent, too. I’ve been listening to a lot of books on CD during my commute and find myself slipping into an English accent which fades to Australian to
For as long as I can remember I have sworn to myself that I wouldn’t be the “person” whom I’m becoming…maybe it was even born on the day my mom turned thirty and, to everyone’s dismay, and my ignorance is bliss mentality, she received a black balloon. Two things about me: I love black and I love balloons. Black is classy, elegant, cutting edge and let’s face it, it’s a good color scheme for most people to wear. To my mom this black balloon was a bad thing. To me it was a lesson learned. Don’t send black balloons to mom. Check. I digress. As I was saying, I have had this internal pact with myself to be happy, delirious even, and to satisfactorily enjoy every age for the new adventures it would bring. All of them are beautiful in their own right, after all.
So why am I freaking out? Why are there so many conflicting emotions coursing through my body? Haven’t I, for years, thought 34 (or was it 32?) was the perfect age? After all, a 32 (or was it 34?) year old is taken seriously, has their act together and is respected in positions such as the one I hold. I got through the potty training and that awful awkward pre-teen stage when my teeth were too big for my face and my frizzy hair was tamed into a braid with balls at the top and the bottom (let’s not forget the headband). My rotund little body was shaping into womanhood while wrapped in gauchos and stone-washed coolots that were placed at or above belly button level because that was the style. Gosh I was cool. I wore double slouch socks with the colors inverted and as dorky as I look in those pictures, I got through that and I enjoyed myself. It was during those years that the dreams and hopes began to bloom and my perception of my adult (twenties, mind you) self became solidified. I’ve always known exactly how I wanted to be as an adult. Also, I had this precarious notion that by the time I reached thirty that I would be a married woman with the cutest little curly haired kiddos this side of the planetarium. I would speak at least one more language. I’d be well traveled and wildly successful which brings me to emotion number one: Grief.
Yes, I’m grieving the loss of my twenties. Be not deceived, I’m not afraid of being thirty years old. To quote the age old adage “you’re only as old as you feel”, or “age is just a number”. Who wrote those? Cliché, as it may be, doesn’t help me in my panic driven ‘twenty nine for a few more days’ state. I’m figuratively holding on to a “2” and a “9” like you see in photography studios. I have my legs wrapped around the nine with the hole of it hooked into my foot (just in case) and am tenaciously holding on to the two in a ferocious bear hug daring anyone to mess with me. Age doesn’t care and I won’t be a poser. I’m grieving the loss of the dreams, hopes, aspirations, milestones, stuff, and the person I was supposed to be and have not achieved. In many ways I have far surpassed some of those dreams and others can I really help? Life hasn’t given me that hand in this game. Looking back over the years of my twenties, I have had a really good life. It’s been full of drama. I’ve been fiercely happy and extremely sad. We’re all products of our environments and our choices. I haven’t gone all of the places that I have wanted to go, and I haven’t birthed or adopted any children, but there’s still plenty of time, right? Unless I die of some freak accident or come down with a disease that is fast acting I will probably live to see a lot more days. Therefore the grief is mingled with another emotion: Hope.
Hope is what I’ve been dwelling on all year long. It has been an unspoken resolution and I find peace, and well, frankly “hope” in it. So now I’m on to the privilege of making my thirties better than my twenties. In some ways I can see the blessing in my growth. I really don’t care as much about what other people want and the people pleaser in me isn’t as important. I’m taking care of myself. So what am I going to do to reach those twenties and now, by default, thirties goals? Well, of course I’m older and wiser, so I’m going to start documenting this journey and we shall all see where this road leads. Look at me getting a head start now. I am doing this for me not for you, but if you want to read, I’d be honored.
I realize that to open my arms to this new and exciting life I must let go of the two and the nine. As for the next couple of week plus a few days I’ll be reveling in the glory of being a twenty-something.
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