By Allison Hefner
Three months ago, turning 30 looked like a weekend away in Big Bear camping with my best friends and partner. At 22, 30 was the age at which all of my bad habits would disappear into the background of my fully formed, perfect adult existence, including homeownership and maybe a wife and baby! At 25, I thought the same thing, but raised the stakes by cramming it into a five-year-plan (which I felt pretty good about, because only an adult makes five-year-plans). At 20, I had a decade. At 17, I was coveting the age more and more with every episode of Sex in The City. Just a year before, I was pinky-swearing to marry a friend if still plagued by singledom at this wretched age. And at 10, 30 was simply how old you guessed everyone’s parents were.
10 is also precisely the age I started daydreaming about being an adult. How can I be so confident about that? Well, I had a diary (which was digitally guarded by a voice-activated password) in which I started writing my future plans and M.A.S.H. results down. I no longer have this diary, but I can still remember exactly what 4th-grader-me was busy manifesting: I wanted to marry Jeff Beck, have three babies, live in a two story home, and I wanted to be a veterinarian. Now that I am thirty, the closest thing I have to my ten-year-old fantasy is my memorized database of cow-disease diagnoses from watching every episode of Dr Pol’s reality veterinary show. And, not to brag, but I can diagnose a bloated calf or an infected hoof that needs to be wrapped in copper sulfate in mere seconds at this point.
All that to say, things change, and with them so do plans and timelines. I did turn 30. I turned 30 last month, and if you asked me how I would describe it, I would say this:
30 is: my life on hold.
The truth is, I’ve always wanted all the things most people want to have at 30: a stable job, a house, a family. And, during a year in which I thought I would be high-speed barreling toward my dreams, I am instead on my couch spending hours on hold with the Employment Development Department. In LA, we’ve been under Safer-At-Home restrictions since March 19th. My last day of work was on March 13th. For the first time in my life, I am unemployed. My hair is so long it’s starting to curl in a Jim-Halpert-before-Jim-Halpert-got-hot kind of way. My cat no longer appreciates me, but rather boycotts me by spending all of her time in an amazon box far away from me, and my girlfriend now knows exactly how many times I am capable of farting in a day. It’s hard to not feel terrible about these things.
Before quarantine I had what I call a safety-net of self esteem: things that could ground me when I didn’t feel like I was hitting my milestones in the timeframe that I hoped for. Feeling bad about not owning a home? I could walk ten minutes down to my favorite bar and restaurant and realize there’s not another neighborhood I would want to live in. Feeling old? I could have drinks with friends, take turns talking trash about our lives, and immediately feel better because we realize we all feel the same way. Feeling unattractive? I could get a haircut. Quarantine has left me without my safety-net of pleasures.
Without my welcomed diversions, I feel a daily visit of impending doom that I didn’t expect to be feeling at this age. Every day I wonder “will there still be a place for me in this world when things go back to normal?” and “will I ever work again?” and “will I ever again be as cute as I was when I was 28, back when my girlfriend and I first met, and I wasn't in quarantine eating 6 meals a day?” Though these questions are the closest thing to a daily routine that I have right now, miraculously, at the same time, I feel relieved.
This is upside of turning 30 in quarantine - accepting that the state of things is exactly as they are, and all they can be for now. It is the antithesis of what I’ve made this age out to be. Before, 30 represented perfect order - all the bills paid just in time to have dinner on table for the family by 6pm. Now, 30 is a slow burning chaos where I sometimes take unplanned naps in the middle of the day. Three months ago, I wanted my birthday to be a perfect weekend camping in the mountains. I wanted turning 30 to mean that I had my life in order. I wanted to be a wealthy, home-owning, parent. I didn’t get my camping trip, I didn’t get to turn into the perfect human being I thought I would be overnight, and I didn’t get a good haircut. What I did get was an easter egg hunt filled with the kindest messages from my loved ones that left me sobbing in a way I don’t think a campfire or a fade could have. I got two birthday cakes, many zoom calls, and most importantly, I got a shift in perspective.
Every day I wake up to my life, just as I’ve built it, and I get to experience it hour by hour. And yes, sometimes it feels painstakingly slow, but I welcome this pace that was once at a speed so fast it was best calculated by a five-year-plan. Thirty used to look different, and though I am looking at it from quarantine, I am looking at it with the most loving partner, family, and friends by my side, from my most favorite apartment I've ever lived in. The Craftsman house in the perfect shade of green, well maybe that will happen by 40. Afterall, I’ve got a decade.
And Jeff, if you’re reading - it wasn’t you, it was definitely me.
Allison Hefner is a filmmaker and photographer based in LA. When she isn’t working (two months and counting) she’s busy cooking, woodworking, playing music, or watching a Rom Com.