On Turning 35

My birthday is next week and something about turning 35 feels different enough to warrant a blog post, so here we are.

The much younger me.

I have to start with saying how excited I am.  I know each year is a gift and to have (nearly) 35 so far – wow! I feel incredibly grateful.  I don’t mind aging.  Really! (It turns out, however, that I don’t necessarily love all of the effects of aging, so for the time being I’ll continue covering my grays with highlights.)

I’ve loved my 30’s so far.  I love them much more than my 20’s.

Don’t get me wrong – my 20’s hold some of my greatest memories and I’m thankful for that decade too.   I served in the Navy, joined the Catholic Church, married my husband, and became a mother.  I also ran the first of what has now been five half-marathons and began writing the book that would make me a published author.  That decade was pretty sweet to me, come to think of it.

But in my 20’s I wasn’t always so good to myself.  I let the fear of other’s opinions stop me from even telling anyone I was working on a book.  I wasted time fearing what people would think.  I made all of the things I was accomplishing smaller than they were, because of my own insecurity.

My 30’s have helped me in finding my voice, and being more honest about how I feel and what I want.  Proof of that is here in that I’M SHARING THIS POST.  When I started this blog, I didn’t even share it on any social media platform, or with a single friend or family member.  I let it sit published in blogger, read only by me, until I had a publishing contract.  It seems silly, now. Writing a book is exciting, and I kept it to myself.  I shouldn’t have.

I’ve come a long way but I would be lying if I said my 30’s have made me totally unafraid.  I’m still terrified when I go to a book signing and am standing there, feeling vulnerable-as-heck, trying to convince strangers on why they should buy my books.  But I do it scared.  I show up, and I smile, and that is a lot more than the 20-something-year-old version of myself would do.

Now that next week I’ll be half-way to 70 (funny way to think of 35, yes?) my plans are to continue to grow in my faith, work hard on being the wife and mother my family deserves, and nurture the writing desire that has grown from embers to a fire inside of me.  I’m going to be less quiet about who I am and what my goals are.

The writing goals? They are to improve my writing with each book.  And they are to have more written books.  I used to say that I wanted as many published books as babies birthed – but now that I’m halfway there, and still young, the number is higher.  I’ll say ten . . . for now. 

But should I leave this Earth tomorrow, and not complete that goal, all would still be well with my soul.  I’ve been given (nearly) 35 years by my creator, and for that all I can say is thank you, God.

Until next time . . .