Friday, Oct. 22, 2010 11:25 p.m.

I'm old now.

I don't have time to write much right now - I gotta go get ready/clean for my party tomorrow - but I want to jot something down before it leaves my mind.

I was doing totally fine with turning 30 today. Facebook is nice; lots of people leave messages; it makes a person feel as though their existence is noticed. I hardly ever leave facebook birthday wishes, so I don't feel like I really deserve anyone else's - but it still was nice to receive all those that I did today.

I am mostly ok being 30. I knew the day would come. I'd been mentally preparing myself for at least at year. I am 30. My youth is gone. I have gotten nowhere significant in life. It sucks, but it's the truth and I have to accept it. I was prepared to just go on with life in my 30s.

Then I got a gift in the mail from my parents. It funny how it's often the small, inconspicuous things that can really set you off. The package was sent directly from a store, and the packing slip had no note attached. The price was included on the slip too, as though it weren't meant to be a gift. But there was an address listed that was the same as my parents, so I assumed it must have come from them. I had expected something, well, practical or meaningful, I suppose, but at least of some significance. Afterall, this is a big deal birthday for me. It's very difficult, turning 30. My parents don't really know that of course, but I guess I hoped that they had sensed it somehow. Or at least just realized that 30 is a significant age.

I opened the package and was really confused. It was a "magic wine holder", pretty much a wooden stick, covered in an artificial leather, with a hole at one end that sat an an angle on the countertop and balanced a bottle of wine. I mean, it was kind of interesting and I tried it out and it worked - but it was an odd gift. Even odder was that because the price was on the packing slip, I knew that it had cost only $13.99.

At first, I didn't know if it was from my parents. Maybe a younger sister? It seemed like a very strange gift for a 30th birthday. I texted my mom and asked if this was from her or a sister. She texted back that it was from her and dad and that they thought it was so cool and that I'd like it a lot.

I haven't texted back yet. I just don't know what to say. Or to think about it.

Did they really think it was that cool and that I would think it was so cool too? It just feels so strange. So incomplete. Maybe if they sent along a nice bottle of wine too then it would make more sense. Are they having financial troubles? My parents have always been the kind where they'd tell me if they couldn't afford to get me a larger gift. Why is this their present to me? It really feels like a stocking stuffer more than a gift and I don't know what to make of it.

I think I could've brushed off this gift more if it hadn't been for the fact that I'm having a really hard time not being able to give my parents the first grandchild. I don't think they have any idea how much this has made me feel like I've lost my position as the first born child. I feel so very forgotten; I have nothing to offer; I;m just drifting away from everyone. My mom texted me today about how 30 years ago I made her a mother...and all I could think about was how in two months my sister gets the privilege of making her a grandmother. And I don't.

I also kept thinking about how my mom originally planned to be DONE having kids at age 30. Afterall, she had 4 by then. And here I am, 30, with none. She can't relate to me; we have nothing to bond over.

And then I had a good cry while sitting alone in a car waiting for K who was inside Blockbuster.

Earlier this month, the most serious I've ever thought about it before, I halfway seriously contemplated pulling my car into our small garage tonight, closing the door and leave it running. On my birthday. It seemed like it would be an odd sort of fitting end.

I'm admitting this now, because I am here still and plan to be for awhile (things are going great with K's career and that's exciting), but just realizing that tonight could have been the end, brings a new level to my thoughts.

I don't know how I am this old. I don't know how this has become my life and how it is so off-track from where I ever would've thought it would be.

I've written far longer than I really should have been, so I should go.

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