Today, March 21st, I am turning 30.
It doesn’t faze me much. I could pretend I’m freaking out over the big “3-0” because my twenties are over but really, I don’t care because I am looking forward to many more years of adventures, life experiences, ups and downs and surprises.
I remember turning twenty—Feng and I were backpacking and we had just arrived in Sydney that day. I thought it was pretty cool to celebrate my twentieth birthday Down Under, on the road. If I had been told that ten years later, I’d be a married Canadian citizen with a baby, I would have laughed.
And yet… it happened. Somehow.
I don’t think I changed much in the past ten years. Honestly, physically, I didn’t really… okay, I do have a couple of white hair, courtesy of Baby Mark. That’s about it. I have the same hairstyle, the same (lack of) fashion sense, the same piercings (I didn’t even take off my navel piercing when I was pregnant!), same Doc Martens shoes—gee, I’m realizing I’m actually pretty conservative I guess!
I did gain life experience by immigrating to Canada, working in different environments, living with Feng, having a kid and travelling. I cherish these experiences—each one of them taught me a lot.
I have never set major life goals for myself, such as “must be married by the time I am 25” or “must have a career before I turn 30”. Frankly, I am not even sure how to define success in life—one person’s definition of achievement is vastly different from another. I think I am pretty happy with how my life turned out, especially considering I didn’t plan a single thing.
What matters to me is experiencing the breadth of life experiences, good and bad. I don’t want a boring sheltered life. I want to laugh, I want to cry, and I want to feel happiness, empathy and anger.
So far so good. I’m embracing this new decade… and I’ll pick up some expensive anti-aging cream on the way back home, just in case.
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