Growing old never up!
“Any (wo)man who is not a communist at age 20 is a fool. Any wo(man) who is still a communist at the age of 30 is an even bigger fool.”
George Bernard Shaw
Believe it or not, and I’m sure you don’t, I’m about to turn thirty three. I hit the big three ooohhh three years ago, so I speak with authority on the matter of ageing gracefully. The months before my 30th birthday were traumatic. Not because I’m one to worry about the ticking time bomb, or about what age is going to do to my body, but coincidentally the months leading to my big three-ohhh! were particularly stressful on all fronts. In fact, that year ushered in an unexpected wave of panic and doubt, and despite all the goals I had accomplished I suddenly began to question prior decisions and worry about those I had yet to make.
Thirty is a very funny age. It’s almost as indefinable as being a teenager - a sort of half way house between childhood and adulthood. When you turn 40 it is expected of you to have a mid-life crisis, which means that you can get away with mostly anything – you can sleep with someone half your age, buy an expensive sports car or a useless home appliance, you can even screw up at work and a blind eye will be turned. But if you moan about turning 30 you’ll just be called a whiner.
30 is when denial meets reality. This is when you realize that you can’t party all night and still make it to work the next morning, men realize that their hair is migrating from the top of their heads to their backs, their ears and their nostrils, women will see the first crater forming next to their eyes, in surveys we now fall under the 30 to 39 category and, we officially move from the MTV generation to the VH1 generation.
At this age we realize that pubs have become a cross between dance clubs and brothels, and that hangovers really hurt. I think I can handle my drink better now (simply because there’s more body weight to handle it), but my tolerance for hangovers is gone. Images of hammers thumping into my forehead start sneaking into my head while I’m still out drinking, and they automatically make me slow down.
Somewhat humbled and heartbroken, the day before I turned 30 I found myself asking what’s a woman supposed to have achieved by this crucial time in her life? Some friends suggested that by now I should have experienced one or all of the following: paragliding, living in a foreign country, rock climbing, bondage, motorcycling, singing karaoke at the top of my lungs, and alternative sex (alternative to what I still haven't figured out.) My family on the other hand advocated a mortgage, a ring on my finger, a successful career, a profitable pension plan, baking, and a baby in the making. With not so much as a crouton in the oven, I could only surmise that now, that I am officially in my 30s, there’s an underlying expectation that I’m supposed to have it all figured out!
Just to make turning thirty a little more bearable I tried to remember how spotty I was in my teens, how drunk I got on my 21st, and how broke I was in my 20s. By now I thought that my career, finances and love life would be sorted, but although most of the things that worried me in my 20s did get sorted, they simply gave way to another set of problems and uncertainties. I therefore came to the conclusion that just like Ally McBeal, it’s useless striving hard to solve my current problems because I’m most likely to go out and find new ones!
Once you turn thirty dating options slim down, way down in fact. And it's not long before we learn that dipping our pen in the company ink is a definite no no, so where do you meet people when you're thirty? At the pharmacy? What's worse is that now that your good years are dwindling, you can’t afford to spend time with the ‘wrong’ person, so the pressure to find Mr. or Ms. Right is stronger than ever. Speaking of marital bliss, the rate at which friends keep getting married at this age is absolutely alarming - 5 this wedding season alone. Although my closest circle of friends have not dared touch those boundaries as yet, I know that it’s just a matter of time before most of them turn into self absorbed creatures rocking kids to sleep and fixing dinners for their partners.
Soon after my 30th birthday my brain kicked back in and I came to the wise realization (or desperate rationalization) that unless you turn it into one, turning 30 is not a death sentence. With all that I know today I wouldn’t choose to go back in time for anything in the world. So what if you’re not where you thought you would be at 25, 35, 55, or 65? Everyone’s life plan deviates off course at some point. What matters is that we make the most of the journey and learn from our past to make the future better. I’ve learnt not to be afraid of what’s in store because just like birthday presents, the neatly packaged ones are not necessarily the ones you’ll enjoy the most.
I’ve also learnt that:
- unless you already have them, there should be absolutely no mention of husbands or babies at your 30th birthday party. You are not Bridget Jones!
- what you’re hearing on that kid’s radio in Paceville is not random horrendous noise but a whole new breed of hip hop/trance fusion that you had no idea exists.
- no matter how hard you try to resist, life will transform you more and more into your mother
- hangovers are more than just a myth.
- memory lapses will have you re-hiring rubbish movies or re-reading books you’ve already had to endure once.
- your mildly impressive ‘O’ levels look shameful compared to the 10 ‘A’ level results every 16 year old now receives as a matter of course.
- Cellulite is here to stay
- Whoever came up with the concept of ‘relaxed pants’ was a genius
- only now is it acceptable to like Radio Calypso
- it is still not acceptable to admit that you like country music and line dancing (but I do)
- clicking on the “self destruct” button when things get intense is not an option anymore.
- when two people truly love each other they should be together no matter what, except when one of them owns a knuckle ring glove.
- I will start being asked to write features about turning 30!
First published on FM Magazine in 2006
Alison Bezzina