by Larraine Bishop

Created on: August 11, 2008   Last Updated: December 11, 2008

I thought about turning thirty many times before my thirtieth birthday. I thought of the good things about turning thirty and also the things I did not like about turning thirty. As memories would drift through my mind I thought about the things that made me happy and the things that made me sad. I then began to think about what could be done to avoid turning thirty and getting older and older every year. I came to the conclusion that if I continued to live on this earth, I would have birthdays and that every year I would get older. I had the choice to celebrate or to mourn each year passing.

I then thought about my grandmother who passed away at age ninety-three. The doctors said that there was nothing wrong with her. Her body was still in very good shape; she just got tired of living. At her funeral, I remembered that in her seventies she would watch me, my two sisters and my two cousins (all under age five) while our parents worked on the farm. She was always kind and happy except on her birthday. Every year on her birthday she would wring her hands and exclaim, "Girl, I just don't know if I will ever see another birthday!" Her comments somewhat irritated me. I did not understand how she could talk about such things on her birthday. She was always busy with a project of some sort. She was always encouraging and loving toward us and I was too little to worry about what age she was or how long she would be with us. I remember wanting to be like her when I grew up with one exception, that was how I experienced my birthday each year.

So it was that when I turned thirty, I celebrated all the good things in my life that brought me to this birthday and chose to forget the sad things in life for a day. It was at this point in my life that birthdays were nice to have but living the other 364 days of the year was even more important. Living life to the fullest, giving, loving, and caring for those around me became more important than just who I was and what I had accomplished.

My thirtieth birthday, was a good day. It was a day of celebration. I enjoyed every minute of it. It was not until two days before I turned thirty-one that I thought about being in my thirties again. That was the day my younger sister, who was born two days before my first birthday called me in a very distraught state. This alarmed me as she is a tough person and cries very little. When I asked her what was wrong, she confessed that she was so sad that she was turning thirty and she did not want

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