This one is for my friend Lauren, who asked me this via Facebook.

People think I’m lying, but I AM NOT: I am not upset about turning thirty next week. People think it’s esteem-crushing to say I’m OLD.

But it doesn’t bother me, because I know that I’m only as old as I feel, and let me tell you people something: to be the mother of one Chooch J. Robbins, one must have a certain internal youth. It’s a good thing he has both parents, because Henry does not have that. In fact, I’m convinced that Henry has a gnarled little troll living inside him.

I do not feel old.

I can’t imagine that just because I will be 30, I’ll stop going to shows.

That is seriously, aside from my son, the most important thing in my life. I actually feel like it fuels my well-being. I go to more shows now than I did when I was a teenager, or even in my early twenties. And really, I don’t even feel old THEN, in a room full of sweaty, bouncing, moshing kids.

Most of my twenties were very dark. I feel that the older I get, the more self-aware I become. Because of this, it gets a little easier to understand my actions and why I make the decisions I do.

I spent so much of my twenties not DOING anything because I was scared. Part of the reason I left LiveJournal was because I wanted to put myself out there more. Part of the reason I started painting again was because I hadn’t given myself the chance to express myself in the ways I needed and it was time to break that shackle off.

The older I get, the more I’m able to extract myself from my family, and they have always been the #1 problem in my life.

The older I get, the more I’m able to call an asshole an asshole and remove those weeds permanently from my life.

The older I get, the less self-conscious I become.

I really just want the last decade, well – most of it, to fall away into the past. And that is why I’m excited to be turning 30. Plus, I get to have cupcakes from Vanilla Pastry Studio, holla!!

And I doubt that I will feel old any time soon, so nyah.