thirty

Tonight is the last night of my twenties.

I sat--alone, Husband is at an employees-only-because-we-are-too-cheap-to-pay-for-drinks-for-your-significant-others holiday party--eating frozen pizza and watching Julie & Julia. Realizing that I prefer the movie over the book specifically because it's a Nora Ephron film.

Perhaps I've been thirty since age eleven (probably around the time I saw Sleepless in Seattle for the first time). 

I only made it through approximately the first fifteen minutes. The Queens-bashing (more prevalent in the book) gets under my skin. But what got under my skin even more was Julie Powell's feeling of failure upon turning thirty.

I've written a novel. And I'm constantly rewriting it, so its latest iteration is only approximately thirty pages long. Appropriate? So perhaps in essence I haven't written a novel at all. I have a Masters degree I'm not really using, since I have the same job I had before--and during--the program. I feel a little like Julie Powell. Except with a lot more love for Queens.

So I stopped watching the movie--in spite of all the cooking, all the France, and all the Streep--in order to work on my novel. I tend to plot while I'm falling asleep (is this normal?) in a daydream-type pattern. And I figured out what to do with the scene I've been working on like a week ago. But I never got around to writing it.

But then I opened my laptop and had a Blogger tab open and remembered that I wanted to write a "birthday" blog post. This is it, I suppose.

For many years--since I turned twenty-five, I think--I've dreaded this day. Well, not this one. I'm still twenty-nine. Tomorrow is the day I've been dreading.  Except at some point in the past year, I stopped dreading it. But why did I dread it to begin with?

More than any other seminal age--sixteen, eighteen, twenty-one--thirty feels like a true milestone. I really feel like an adult. I'm married, I've had the same job for five years, I've lived in the same apartment for five years, and I feel settled. Settling down, getting away from the constant moving, upheaval, and change that can riddle our twenties feels amazing to me.

Yeah, I've been thirty for a while, if that's my definition of thirty. I'm ready for what's next. The real settling down. Starting a family, maybe investing in real estate (or continuing to rent because real estate is insane and we like having a super to fix the toilet), and, before all that, really figuring out what I want in a career. I think that was the thing that made me hesitate about turning thirty. It seemed like I should have had that figured out, and have been moving up the ladder already. But I don't feel the need to move up the ladder. I think when it comes down to it, raising our family will be my real career, so why try so hard to pursue anything else? I'd love to freelance, have a bit of a schedule and some projects to keep me on task--and be able to stay home and watch my kids grow up.

There. I said it. I'm turning thirty in a postfeminist world and I want to stay home with my kids. If I can stay home and we have enough money to feed them, I'll feel very lucky indeed.

That's what thirty means to me. The blossoming of the things planted in my twenties. Maybe it won't be this blog turning into a book--eek, who wants to hear me talk about myself that much?--like Julie & Julia. I only hope that ten years from now, I'll be tending my harvest.

update: home office fail

I have tragic news.

We took a trip to West Elm over the weekend. The Parsons desk, in real life, was as disappointing as the movie we saw afterward.  While I realize we're not going to get solid wood at our price point, when we're willing to go above our price point for something, we'd like it to feel like it's worth it. I think floor models are very telling in how pieces of furniture will fare in the future. These puppies hadn't fared well. On one model, the drawers looked off kilter, on another, they didn't seem to be on their rollers at all.

It didn't seem like a "forever" desk to us, even though it was at a "forever" price.

And while I could spend a considerable amount less on something from Overstock, I think we're over the West Elm Parsons desk and its knockoffs.

Thankfully, my recent trips to Ikea.com have given me great insight into their categorization. It turns out we don't want an office desk. At Ikea, these are approximately 19" deep--aka: not deep enough to provide the expansive work space we desire and have the space for. We want a work table instead.

With Ikea, we know what we're getting. We, like many twentysomethings, have had many liasons with an allen wrench and variously-labeled MDF pieces. And instructions written in the language of a stick figure with a question mark over his head.

Honestly, if all we're going to get at any price point is MDF with veneer, I'd rather pay the MDF price.  Ikea may not be forever.  But Ikea never pretends to be anything it's not.

Now please excuse me as I put my feet up on my solid wood, vintage 1970s coffee table that I got for free because my parents had good taste when particle board was just a glint in everyone's eye.

home office

Oh my God, you guys!

I have been such a bad blogger. I have plenty of things to write about (throw pillows, eco-friendly holiday decorations, new year's resolutions, turning the big 3-0...) but I have been very remiss in putting together any coherent posts.

That's all going to change. Today.

Because we are back in business! The holidays knocked us for a loop, but I'm now inspired to go forth on what seems to be a neverending project: the living room.

I thought we might be almost finished. But, you see, in a  New York one-bedroom apartment, a large living room serves many functions. Thankfully ours doesn't also have to function as a dining room, since we are blessed with an eat-in kitchen. However, its two main functions--living room in general and office--didn't get equal footing in our fall overhaul. I gave up one computer desk in exchange for a small kitchen table, and it's definitely not cutting the mustard.

It looks like an afterthought. And with our terrible tendency to collect clutter, the work space gets smaller and smaller every second. Husband was working from home the other day, with one tiny laptop amid a sea of paperwork waiting to be filed, extra holiday cards, returned holiday cards, and computer paraphernalia. It looked like he was being punished.

And he shouldn't be punished. You know what would make both of us feel like we weren't being punished while working at home? A Parsons desk:

West Elm

Oh yeah baby. That's 8 square feet of work space, better known as 8 square feet for us to clog up with clutter.

Or will we? Right know we're struggling with the files of 2 adults stuffed into 2 Rubbermaid file drawers. And the accessories of countless electronic devices (German cell phone, anyone?) stuffed into 4 smaller Rubbermaid drawers. The two sets of drawers don't match. It's not good. It's not well thought out.

Enter our new friend Erik:

Ikea

Erik has a friend:

Ikea

Are you counting what I'm counting? 4 file drawers! And a total of 3 smaller drawers, including the 2 on the desk.

Again, I warn you that this is not a blog on saving money or scrimping when it comes to home decor. The West Elm Parson's desk is not cheap, but short of the customizable solid wood (or whatever other material you want) version from Room & Board, it feels like a smart investment to us. A Parson's desk is a classic in modern design and will truly fit its surroundings, even if one day we have a separate office space. I love that it doesn't have much to it, but still manages to have drawers. With some smart desk organizers, I think our office space will look more like a statement rather than an after thought. And perhaps encourage me to upload all the pictures I take with this blog in in mind and actually write the posts.