A Treatise on Aging

Today, for the second time in less than a week, I felt as if I was aging much too quickly.

The first time came when I received and e-mail from a good friend, from whom I hadn't heard anything in awhile. She is expecting Baby #6 a short while after Baby Girl is due. She is a little more than two months older than I am. I am beyond happy for her, but at the same time, I felt my bones start to creak, my back ache and my lung capacity reduce slightly (okay, it might have something to do with the fact that Baby Girl has wedged herself, permanently, underneath my right lung in full breech position). I said to myself, "I cannot possibly be old enough to have a friend my age who has six children."

The second time came today, while interviewing candidates for an entry-level position at The Factory (I'm not coming up with a new name for my new job, since I was only at the last one for a short time). One candidate looked at me from across the conference table and said, "I don't know how old you are, but I'm young and this is my perspective." It didn't help that the candidate looked to be about 16, even though I knew from the resume that the candidate had to be at least 21.

Lesson #1: Don't make the person who is interviewing you (who is going to be your boss, if hired), feel old. (Lesson #2: Totally irrelevant to this post, but when you're interviewing for a professional position, wear a suit for crying out loud!)

In The Frontier, I've come to feel as if my aging process has sped up. In VA, I was "the norm" - having Baby Girl just shy of leaving my 20s, after having been married nearly half a decade - the epitome of young, professional women everywhere in metropolitan East Coast. Here, everyone assumes I am just starting my 20s. When they realize I'm not, I get the knowing look of "oh that's too bad, there aren't seven children in your future." (Side note: even if I had Baby Girl in my early 20s, there still wouldn't be seven children in my future - especially if I had to be pregnant seven times).

Aging isn't a bad thing. I've long proclaimed that turning 30 will be my favorite birthday. All of my post-30 friends claim 30 is a far better decade than 20. I have to agree, and I'm not even there yet - ones 20s are turbulent. They are full of self-discovery and adventure, to be sure, but they are also wildly unpredictable - a recipe for chronic heartburn and ulcers for a "plan everything out years in advance" kind of person like me.

Even still, I don't want to FEEL old until I am. Right now, I feel old, and I don't like it.