Dirty 30

So I am turning 30 in a little under 6 months. I want to do something special, something 30-worthy, but I am kind of drawing a blank. I'll be with many of my friends shortly after the big 3-0 at Julah/Nolia's wedding in June. And having a party in Flagstaff, while surely better attended than it would have last year, I am still afraid would be more depressing than exciting and maybe make me rewind back to 29 in protest.

So, I need ideas. Special experiences or trips. One idea is to plan a fun warm weather trip for next fall/winter and do something smaller in May. One idea for that is a spa weekend, maybe in Sedona or Phoenix. But I want more ideas.

In general, while also feeling a general sense of disbelief, I am pretty psyched about my 30s. My 20s were, on balance, wearing rose-colored glasses and totally in retrospect-- pretty rad. It's a little like I felt when I was turning 23. I turned 22 the weekend we graduated from college. By the time a year had gone by, I felt like so much had happened and so many changes had occurred I deserved some external marker-- like being a different age.

When I turned twenty I was in Japan with my dad and his wife, I was toasted by the Japanese Communist Party leader and ate a lot of sushi. Then I lived in Boston over the summer and ate ice cream every day and walked miles to the library to check my email twice a week. Then there was September 11 and we lived in the In-town and I lived in Minnesota for a couple of months and then I went abroad and then I turned 21 in Buenos Aires. I also ate a lot of sushi then. Anyway, that was a long time ago. I am still friends with basically all my friends from then. It makes all these background checks easier. Smiley face. But I am pretty different, but also not. I am ready for a new decade to recognize it.

Now, back to the challenge, how to commemorate it?!?