the one where they all turn 30

My blogging is sparse these days, but honestly, it hasn't been all that eventful around these parts. Christmas this year was low key, just the nuclear family - Mom, Dad, and John - and lasagna. A few days before Christmas, John and I discovered Photo Booth on his Mac Book, and we had quite a bit of fun (as you can see) with our distorted Christmas photos. My mom had them printed on a photo Christmas card and sent them to the family. And now, we are on the eve of 2009. It's a quiet day at the office, and I'm counting down to 3:00 PM when I can leave. With the dawning of the new year, I will also begin counting down to my 30th birthday, which is February 15. I didn't think I would be one of those people who freaks out on their 30th birthday, but it has been looming ominously in the distance, creeping ever closer and the days tick by. It's just a number, and I realize that thirty isn't OLD, per say. But it is a milestone, and one of those birthdays I think that makes you ponder where you've been, where you are, where you would like to be, where you thought you would be at thirty...
I'm not sure where I thought I would be. I had a bit of a freak out after I graduated from college when the realities of life post meal plan set in. Instead of all of our benchmarks happening at the same intervals (drivers license at 16, high school graduation at 18, off to school, out into the world at 22) the timetables were all different for everyone. So I decided to throw mine out of the window. I have friends who have 3 year plans, 5 year plans, 10 year plans, but I have been more comfortable letting life unfold as it does, taking the next step when it feels natural, instead of saying I had to be a certain place at a certain time. This has worked pretty well for me, and it has alleviated a lot of my performance anxiety, if you will. So, why is it, as 30 inches closer, that I feel so unnerved?
I keep thinking about that episode of Friends when Rachel turns 30 and she realizes that she has less time than she thought she did. She wants to have a baby by 36, so that means she has to be pregnant by 34. She wants to be married three years before she has a baby, so she has to be married at 31, but she wants to be engaged for a year before she gets married....so she needs to be dating the person she wants to marry...right then. All of a sudden, before you know it, the time has just slipped by. I was talking to Eric about turning 30, as he is two years older than me, and he said he didn't really worry about 30 because he felt like it just meant he had ten more years until he was 40, and the clock just kind of reset. I think its different for women because of the childbearing thing. The hard, disturbing truth of the matter is that the eggs just aren't always fresh. So, at almost 30, we feel like 35, that magical age where your eggs are supposedly and suddenly going bad, is just around the corner. It's really bizarre. So, out of the blue, I'm bordering on spinsterdom.
Le sigh. It's all a bit much, and it's a bit dramatic of me, too, I realize. I'm not doing so bad for 29...almost 30. I'll have a masters degree by the end of the year, I directed a play with Jane Fonda in it. That's pretty good. But there's so much more I wish I had. I guess that's always the way it is, the grass is greener, there's still more to be done. And perhaps I should be glad that its not all over and done with, that I haven't checked it all off the list and am twiddling my thumbs with nothing left to do. I suppose it means that all of these things that I'm waiting for are still out there for me to find. 30 isn't the end of the road, of course. But for me, it feels like a clock that was never ticking, a timeline that never existed, has just been imposed on me out of the blue. Le sigh all over again.