31.

“Enjoy yourself. That’s what your 20s are for. Your 30s are to learn the lessons. Your 40s are to pay for the drinks.” – Carrie Bradshaw

that carrie bradshaw, she's a genius.

the other day i turned 31.

goot lawd!!!

thirty one?! (i typed it out like that makes it seem older, get it?!)

why in the hell does 31 feel so much older than 30?

am i the only one feeling this way?

nards. 

i welcomed 30. it seemed refreshing and oddly liberating. 

but 31, feels like a swift kick in the bum.

maybe its just me, but what life is right now, is not at all what i pictured my thirty one year old self to be. not because its bad, or because i had created this vision of my mature thirty one year old self at a reasonable age. i mean really, i think when i pictured myself at thirty one, i was probably seventeen.

that picture had me in a nice huge home, not in cheyenne. i had a handful of children and the youngest was by no means an infant because lets face it, at seventeen, thirty one seemed like fifty five. i churned my own ice cream, ran my own business, made delicious well rounded meals three times a day and always had the best clothes. mostly from the gap. at seventeen the gap also seemed a bit more mature. i know, goofy, but true.

and i now i sit here, at thirty one, and i feel more seventeen than i did at the time. i feel like i am just getting started. i feel like i recently figured out who i am and what i want to be when i grow up. oh and p.s. "figuring out" does not mean accomplishing, it simply means putting together ideas to start to get there. it seems like in my mind this was kind of, dare i say, old. and in my reality, this is really just the beginning. 

so i'm not gonna lie. the day of 31, dun.dun.dunnnnnn. well, it was not one of my finer. but i survived. after a much needed talk with a dear old friend, (i know you are reading, and you are gold to me. thank you, thank you, thank you.) and a splash of cold water to the face (thats what you do to pull it together when you are a nursing mom and can't down a stiff one on the rocks, wild, i know), i realized that i needed to re evaluate.

no i do not live within the linda 31.0 that i envisioned. not even close. but, i do live in one who is very, very blessed. i live in a version of myself that is working on herself. that is on her way to being a more complete and better version than my wildest dreams dreamt. i am learning (sometimes most times the frickin hardest way possible) how to live this beautiful crazy life. and i am better for it each day. and rather than living by an assumption based upon number, i am learning to live by the blessings so many only dream of having. and in reflection of said day, i was actually ok, because it was filled with other things i need to be me. it had dash. noa. a weigh in that finally put me only ten lbs over my pre pregnancy weight. a safe home. and two parents who still, 31 years later, give me a cake with candles and the best gifts. hallooo?! that's waaaaay better than churning my own ice cream. 
oh, and i cannot discount that not all is lost, i did get a gap gift card which i fully intend on using to buy some mature, 31 year old appropriate denim boot cuts. so there. 

all in all. maybe i am not who i thought i would be. but i am healthy and blessed and no longer living to any age based expectations. i am learning. and therefore i am better. 

amen and hallelujah. 

(all that being said, 32, you are welcome, but feel free to take your sweet time. :-) )