Dirty 30

  The first of my girlfriends, Allie, turned 30 today.  Her birthday starts the rolling calendar of all the girls becoming a year older.  I'm next in January and the idea of turning 30 is a very foreign one to me.  

    Obviously I have never turned 30 before so it should be, but I can remember growing up always saying that I would be so old when I turned 30.  Now that the number is only a few months away, I realize how wrong I was about my future (just one of the many ways I was totally ignorant about my future).   The thing is, I now realize 30 isn't old at all.  Physically I can feel the differences between my early 20s and now.  I find myself falling asleep at the bar if I stay out too late and it isn't because I have had one too many to drink.  I threw my back out for the first time about six months ago, leaving me unable to walk comfortably for over a week.   Mentally and emotionally though, I still feel young.  Really young.  I don't think of myself as an adult and when I am with a large group of people, I look at people 20+ years older than myself as the grownups.  When I see that someone is 35 online, I have to remind myself that I am only five years away.  If you ask me how old I am, the first number that pops into my head is 27 and I always have to remind myself I passed that number a bit ago.   I own a house, two cars, have been in a relationship with Boyfriend for over ten years now.  If those things don't make me feel like an adult, having a kid should.  But I just don't.  I still feel young.  I still feel like I will get in trouble with my mom if I don't clean my house (ok-that actually does happen when she comes over).   I'm not quite sure when I will decide that I am an adult.  Maybe when I hit 40.  Or maybe when Baby's friends refer to me as "Mrs. So and So".  I'm starting to really understand the cliche of, "age is just a number".     Or maybe, as long as I am friends with my girlfriends, I will never feel like an adult.  Our group became a group nearly 20 years ago.  I imagine just ten years from now, when Allie is turning 40, I will be posting (if there is still blogging going on) something very similar looking back at myself and shaking my head at my naivete.