Thirty, sounds dirty, like thirsty, 30 years, 30 hours, more than a day. 30 minutes to myself as sweetpea does her late nap thing. 30 breaths I take in during my massage present 3 days before my 30th day of Birth.
This marks the day I came out of the womb, the doctors told my mama she had to be operated on so I was taken out of the womb and into my parents ready and excited hands. A girl, 2 boys and 1 girl, one blonde head in a family of dark brown and black. One set of arched dark eyebrows, poetic passionate dreams, deep green/blue/gray eyes that turn into half moons when I smile. The same half moons I look upon in my dad and babies eyes.
In 2 days I turn 30, I will have been on this planet, breathing this air, taking in all this information for 30 years. Now I am an adult, I will try on this label without the young attached to it. An adult, the chosen people, what we are striving to be, what we are told we should be to early on, now I am me. What next? What does life hold for me now? Will the adventures with white and gold foxgloves and deep blue Mediterranean sea continue?
I have this new unit of my very own called a family. For a very long time it seems I was solo, just me, the pure fun of deciding to have life completely on my terms. Now my choices involve another and then another. It is so sweet being braided into the inner and outer workings of two of my most favorite humans. Still I long for unbridled aloneness, the unpredictable adventures and twists and turns I get myself into when flying solo. I catch these moments now and hold them in a glass bottle like a tiny ship to examine in times of duress. I get them when I go on artist dates and write my soul out, when I take the time to go outside and listen to the birds of central Texas while my baby sleeps in the other room. I also get them while checking facebook and watching historical fiction movies on netflix while eating mint chocolate squares.
30 witching years, a time to reflect and notice some of my achievements
age 8 3rd grade, I write my first story about candy people who get stuck to their beds at night.
age 9 4th grade, I do a ton of art projects and miss a lot of school
age 10 5th grade, I win grand prize in a play writing contest after writing "The Spider Who Wanted to Find A Home." The Yale Dramat Children's theater acts out the play, my grandmother comes to see it from TX, my dad brings me a dozen roses. I am also editor of the school newsletter this year.
age 12 7th grade, Am hating school, decide to take a year off, feel like English teacher is crushing my love of writing, look into alternatives. Last day of school I take a role of caution tape and walk out the doors of institutional schools for 12 years.
age 14, Start hanging with a group of drop out/ unschoolers, make good friends, start thinking about youth lib, start talking about organizing. Help organize a teen weekend for unschoolers with new friends, really decide to stay out of school.
ages 15 & 16, Rocking the unschooler life, volunteering at the natural history museum, writing letters to all my good friends sprinkled across the North East. Regularly spending weekends in NYC, going to art shows, hanging out in parks and shops. Thinking about future dreams and travel. Start doing photography, learning from a neighbor and taking classes at the local arts center. Organize a teen weekend just for women, one of the funnest and most revolutionary experiences of my life.
age 17 Work as a nanny, my first job, save enough money to go and travel in France by myself for two months. Leave in April for Paris, inspired by Billie Holiday, a romantic from the beginning. Also fall in love. While in France decide to move to the North West, following adventure and where the person I loved lived.
age 18 Move to the North West, have my first big break up, decide to stay, get a job at a bakery, a new sweet little house with roommates. Join in the WTO Protests in Seattle 1999.
age 19 Go on a bus trip with dear friend to New Mexico, hitch hike around, camp, swim, stay in a tepee have the time of our lives. Go back to Seattle start a resource center for self educated and drop out youth.
age 20 Save up money and take friend from New Mexico trip with me to Europe for the third time in my life (first trip when I was 6 & 7 with my family) Go to Greece and work on an organic orange farm, Go to the isle of Lesbos, have a ball, decide to join a group of activist and do a 2 week nonviolent action camp in Israel and Palestine. Take ferry there, do the camp, completely life changing and very intense. Decide I am not ready to risk my personal safety for the cause but am very happy to have the experience. The rest of the trip takes me to Egypt, Italy and a road trip to Belgium. September 11th happens I decide I need to be back in the States. Fly into DC for protests against invading Afghanistan. Meet my mom on the street, tears in our eyes.
life is so raw and real, looking at all that I have managed to do I am happy to see how much I have packed in to my 30 years. I will continue the auto biography highlights in my next post. For now I notice, I am soon 30, what a life.
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