An Bitter Old Man Turns 30

As anyone who met me in college knows, I tend to split my time between one of two maturity levels: age 10 and age 90. For some reason, my mental progression often avoids the norm and instead bounces around like a 20 sided Dungeons & Dragons die. I have proven this multiple times in life (much to my chagrin some days):

• I programmed through the night of my 21st birthday - not weird for a CS major until you realize the assignment was due 10 days later.
• For my 13th birthday I didn't ask for a bike or a video game. No, I asked for a footlocker. Luckily there is video evidence of a fat, young Chad celebrating such an outstanding gift in no more than tighty whities and a grin.
  
• I married at 23. Enough said.

The list can go on and on, but I'm not here to bore you. Instead, I've decided to join the clan of several million other middle class, nearly middle age white kids who don't have enough to bitch about. I'm going to rebel by using my MacBook in an open air cafe (actually, airport food court, but I still look equally as artsy/edgy/douchy), hop on a free Wi-Fi connection (take that, The Man), throw together some semi-coherent thoughts in text that is amicable to the eye (Blogspot gets all the credit for that one) and blow your mind.

That's right, I'm going to write a list of "Why Life Sucks At 30"!

<You may now roll your eyes>

Reason 1 - Recovery is Difficult
It seems like only yesterday I was able to go for a 5 mile run at a killer pace as a warm up for a 90 minute soccer game. This was a routine occurrence for nearly two years of my life. Now I take days just to recover from a quick hour long jog and am still sore for days after. This goes for other areas of life as well, but we need not discuss my drinking and night time habits here.

Reason 2 - Things Shift
I weigh less now than I did in High School. Or college. Or pretty much any other time in my life when I wasn't training for a half marathon. Oddly though, I somehow have gained moobs and a tummy that is getting disturbingly close to my belt buckle. Even odder, my waist size has gone down, but my shirt size is going up. Truly a Cathy moment.

Reason 3 - Everyone Else is Settling Down
Everyone I know seems to be settling down and becoming adults. Houses are being bought, nuptials planned and exercised, children bred and berthed. Meanwhile I'm rebelling against any possible stability by selling a house, moving to a new city and dating a wonderful young lady that barely falls in my age range. Throw in a Corvette and a receding hair line, and I believe you have the definition of a very early mid-life crisis.

Reason 4 - I Just Don't Care
I remember being a spry, young, ambitious 24 year old who was going to change the world. Sure there were hoops in the government software cycles, but I could jump through them and help make them better! The ozone layer - I can help fix it! That bum peeing in a cup and drinking it - here's a buck for food! These days I'm older, theoretically wiser, and very much in a "to each his own" type of mood. It's possible that someone could punch me in the face and I'd just shrug and laugh it off.

Reason 5 - Plan A is Gone, As are Plans B, C, D, E and F
I think there are only about three dozen people who have ever succeeded with plan A and most of them are in some kind of professional sports hall of fame. If someone told me 10 years ago (yes, I was in college 10 years ago) that I'd be one level above bait on the corporate food chain I would have laughed in their face. I'd have laughed them out of the room if they told me I'd be single, renting and living in New York City as well. It turns out that plan G is a lot more fun than any of those others, mostly because I have no idea what is coming next.

So there you have my list of why it sucks to turns 30. Being that I'm in a pessimistic mood, I'll not mention the great parts like getting able to eat a pint of ice cream whenever you like or the little joys like still getting ID'd to buy booze.

Oh, and one more little joy. I get to type this before any commenters do: waaaahhhhhhhh....