Misstropolis

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Thirtysomething

by Rebecca Dorr

Email to a friendPrint this article

I turned 30 several months ago, and despite persistent rumors that the world would come crashing down around me once my 20s had disappeared, I have a confession to make: I actually like being 30. I realize this runs counter to all conventional wisdom. I’m supposed to be sick with anxiety about the direction of my life and the goals I haven’t accomplished yet. Instead, I feel oddly content.

The 20s were good to me. I studied, traveled and tried to challenge myself often. But I also had a rather bad habit of needing to be in control and limiting the way I experienced the world. I never put much stock in omens, rituals or ceremonies – or anything that made a big deal of passing time. I didn’t want any day or object or symbol to mean more than it had to. Sure, I had birthdays, went to weddings and celebrated holidays, but I think that somehow, quietly, I turned my nose up at the whole affair.

I wasn’t always that way.

It’s November, 1981. I’m wearing my favorite denim dress with the big rainbow on the front and a smile as wide as the sky. Indeed, between ages four and 10, I generally had some permutation of the annual girls-not-quite-in-their-teens-gone-wild birthday party. I invited all the girls I knew, mom decorated and wrapped presents, and a specialty cake was ready on cue with candles and much fanfare. I’m sure the mere thought of these parties exhausted my diligent parents, but there was something about them that brought fun and joy. Let’s celebrate another year, my smile flashed at the camera! Let’s have cake!

Age is a funny thing. I defy anyone who says they’ve figured out what it means to be one age or another. Every person takes a singular path from here to there, and age is an arbitrary marker that reflects differently on each individual. Some people are old at eight and young at 91, satisfied at 32 and dissatisfied at 54. Age just skips along and watches the road pass by, but mostly it doesn’t have to dictate the direction.

Which means, at 30, just about anything goes. Sure, there are pressures from the outside – the idea that certain benchmarks must be accomplished before certain ages – and I’m not immune to those pressures. Every once in a while, I can still be stubborn and cynical. But I do believe that this new year has found me less controlling than I was before, and more open to what the world has to offer.

On the day after Christmas, I woke early to an unexpected visitor. A hawk had somehow become trapped in the building and squeezed its way into my loft. There it was, looking down at Larry and me as we, baffled, tried to set it free. We were very rational and orderly about it, devising Plan A and Plan B and analyzing each strategy based on what was best for “our” hawk. About an hour after it appeared, we coaxed it to fly out of the bedroom window.

Many ancient mythologies tell that hawks are messengers from the gods. Instead of scoffing at its import, as I might have done in my 20s, I let our hawk be a good omen for my new year.

It took something as startling as a hawk peering down at me on the day after Christmas for me to see it clearly: it’s not about the age, stupid; it’s a state of mind. And so, on my way to 31, time continues on. I mark it, happily.