Thirties

It's as if someone put a brick on the gas pedal... I see everything happening, and the longer time goes, the harder it is to stop and enjoy the scenery.

I'm flying by every day. Routine is to blame, but not to be belittled. I love my daily routine, mostly because it makes each day as productive as the last and weekends are a blink away. Work is and has remained interesting, intriguing, and as always, very promising. I've never really complained about my career, except for the long hours and indecisive customers. However, the potential continues to grow and I'm always in good positions.

Besides work, I have successfully filled in a spot in my life for fitness. It is always hard in the beginning to shoe-horn in a spot for a gym visit or a morning/evening run. You literally have to move your life around to make it work. Besides doing that, you have to convince yourself that it is in your best interest to change your comfortable routine for a much more challenging one, with no clear, tangible short-term gratification. However, if you can, then you have a power that many search for in life, the power of will.

For me, I've made it routine to visit the gym right after work. My ultimate goal is to wake up earlier in the mornings and knock out the work out before I go in at 9am. That would free up my afternoons after 5pm for whatever social life I've missed (more so not). I'd honestly like to get involved in an evening sport such as my cousin's co-ed cabbage-ball league, or even a kickball league. Kickball? Yes... have you seen the quantity of females that play that? Nuff said!

With this routine, at least for now, I feel like my free time has become the most valuable. Before, things that took up my free time were mostly insignificant. Not the relationship stuff, per-se, but the little "chores," favors, and errands that came up when I was supposed to be "off of work." Now, if I have a moment of free time, whatever comes up must have a substantial value in significance to me. I have entered a time of my life where the time is more valuable than the money. Years ago, I would devote an entire afternoon to something like washing, waxing, and changing the oil on my car. Today, those 4 or so hours are more valuable than the $30 or so to change the oil, the $8 for the car wash (that takes around 10/15 minutes), and the $50 for the once a month wax. Believe it or not, since back then I didn't, that you can reach that point where that 4 hours could be devoted to extra work that would pay you much more than the $90 on car maintenance.

Now, as I enter the last week of my 30th year here, I try to sit back and contemplate my path thus far, and see which way I'm going. Such a dramatic change in my life 6 months ago has me going somewhere I've always wanted to, and I adore each step I take in this new direction. But, now I have to learn what each of these steps mean to me and my future. This time last year, not much thought, if any, was given to each of these steps. Sure, I had a clear goal in mind of the future, but as far as how to achieve it? Well, that was up to circumstance and the consequences of the haphazard decisions I made. I know, that sounds like a pretty frightening way to live, but I tend to live life on the edge!

Being 30 has finally meant more to me than just a number divisible by 10. It actually fits my mental/emotional age better than any other year of my life. You know what it means to be 25 but feel 21, right? Well, I remember being 26 and feeling 23. In fact, I've felt like I was 23 since I was 23! It wasn't until last year when this new path I'm on really put my age and position in life in perspective. I've purchased my first house last year, and that was one of the major pushes in my emotional growth. There's no greater feeling in terms of responsibility and self-worth than owning your own home, at least to me. I'm still absorbing the concept, but now that my mom and brother are in Ecuador for 6 and a half weeks, I have this opportunity to literally feel the house for myself, by myself. I wake up and use the house as I see fit, without compromise. That is such a liberating feeling in itself. And, now that I can walk around this house, down my hallway, into my master bedroom, I can lay down and sleep with a sense of "thirty."