There's A Lot in the Mix...

Oh.  Well, hey.

I turned 36 last week.

How about that, huh?

My birthday fell on a Monday, which meant I started celebrating on Friday night.

To recap:

I went out for one of my favorite things - oysters - with a friend Friday evening.

Thankfully the Cornell schedule shook out so that it wasn't a school weekend.  Which meant I had the days to play.  I woke up on Saturday morning and got to my favorite yoga class before driving north of the city to meet some of my favorite North Shore dwellers for an afternoon of apple picking and catching up. 

As evidenced by the photo below, the weather was really lousy and we had a terrible time.

Reality of MBA life set in a bit on Sunday and I used that day to get ahead on school work. Not wanting to actually have to think about Statistics or Managing and Leading Organizations on your actual birthday makes for a really great motivator.  I emailed the draft of the paper we were working on to my team Sunday night for review, told them we'd discuss on our Tuesday conference call, and promptly went out for cocktails with two friends in town to close out year number 35. 

I took the day off of work on my actual birthday, which was pretty much the best decision I have made a week and change into my 36th year.  Work has been beyond stressful and mildly annoying as of late and I didn't want some frustrating email or excel sheet or forecasting deadline to come in and deliver a major birthday buzz kill.

So, instead I did what any smart 36 year old would do.  I slept in, sipped my coffee and ate breakfast on my porch while opening the gifts and cards various lovely people had sent me, and then I took myself to go get a massage at a spa.  Feeling zen and relaxed, I treated myself to lunch and went on to do a little retail celebrating at some favorite shops.  Forever sale and bargain hunting girl that I am at heart, I even let myself pay full price for two things that I loved immediately, guilt free.

(Oh, and the annual birthday present for myself this year?  Another bag.  Of course.  She's a beauty.)

To round the whole day off I ran home, dropped my purchases, and changed before meeting some more friends out for cocktails and feasting.  And feast we did.

We had oysters.  Naturally.

And there was birthday cake.

A lot of wine, delicious food, and some of the best people I know.

Throughout my birthday, I heard from so many people - my parents, my grandmother, my aunts, my brother, my cousins, and so many friends near and far.  With every phone call or email or text I counted another blessing, felt another zing in my heart as I thought about how truly fortunate and lucky my 36 years have been thus far.  I remember turning 30 and feeling like I was suddenly so old.  30! I thought. How did that happen?  And here I am, six years into the decade with a blink of an eye.  The other day I was speaking with a co-worker about his upcoming 30th birthday.  Just like every 29 year old that's gone before, myself included, he had the same reaction that I did once upon a time about the looming 3-0.  While he was telling me about his birthday woes and fears I plopped down on the corner of his desk.  "Here's the thing about your 30's that's so great," I told him.  "You realize what really matters.  And the stuff that doesn't?  You feel completely and totally okay with saying truthfully, that you just do not give a damn. You will cut out the things that no longer matter to you, decide what you no longer need or want.  In your 30's you focus on what you care about, what you want from your life.  And as for the rest of it?  You will just suddenly not give a fuck, with an ease that will surprise you.  It is an amazingly wonderful and liberating thing." 

And it just gets better every year.

Last year, I wrote about the arrival of 35.  I remember talking about a newly discovered feeling of contentment, of feeling settled enough to just live day by day, of not feeling like I had some grand crazy get there goal in front of me and being okay with that.  What is ironic and funny to me is that a few months into 35 I found myself not feeling settled at. all.  Hindsight being 20/20, it is easy to understand now how I was feeling, but at the time I couldn't quite understand why I was felt so restless and bored.  It was like I'd somehow been lulled into complacency.  And here's a newsflash.  I don't like complacency.

But the great thing about being in your mid-30's is you have been around the block enough to know when you need to do something about certain feelings, when you need to make a change or transition or propel yourself forward.  You decide, and then you do it.  You throw the proverbial backpack over the wall and then you climb over to go get it.  For me, that was going back to graduate school, a decision I have not doubted for a second since I began my adventure.

I remember being 26 and 27 and 30 and telling myself one day I would reach an age where everything made sense to me, where I finally felt like a "grown-up."  At 36, I'm beginning to appreciate that no one ever really feels like a grown-up.  What I have come to realize is that while the adage of "with age comes wisdom" is absolutely true, the joke is on all of us because no one ever really knows exactly what they are doing.  No one. 

At 36, I can tell you that I am finally understanding that I do my best work when I am immensely challenged.  That busy and thought-provoking and expanding and enlightening will always be better for me, personally; that I will thrive more in those environments than I would others. 

I want to grab for all that I can in this life.  I want to keep reaching and growing and learning and unfolding as only I can.  I get tired, exhausted to the point of tears even, but I never want to stop learning or exploring or helping or adventuring. Because gosh, there is SO MUCH to this one wild and precious life.