31.

Yup, that’s my age today.  I’m usually all Let’s party!! for my birthdays.  But oddly, not this time.  Sort of like a birthdays smirthdays attitude and I’m not sure if I like where my head is going on this one.

I think 30 is one of those holy birthdays where even though there’s a 3 on the front of your birthday cards from family with funny you’re-getting-old jokes, it’s a momentous milestone so you’re still excited about celebrating it.  Well 3 plus a 1 behind it just plain feels like Damn, I’m in my 30’s. 

I know, I know, I boast all of the time about the grass is greener on this side of the fence and viva la life.  But to add to those beliefs, 31 just feels like pressure.  Pressure to get things really moving in the direction of my dreamy end goals, as a New Year’s Eve ball drop countdown seems to have appeared in my already-too-full head as of this morning.  Granted an extremely slow ball drop where once it hits 3-2-1 I’ll be basking in a settled home full of kids with an adjacent photography studio on our lot full of my best work on the walls, calendar filled with work that I yearn for.  But I just can’t ignore that sparkly rhinestoned disco ball dangling up there to remind me of where I’m destined to be.

So to distract my thoughts of the new Studio 54 accessory up there, I did what I always do to live in the moment -- just hang out with my family on my birthday.  Taking pictures of Lyla, which always seems to make everything in my head just freeze.  Not think.  Just be.

In order to embrace and not ignore, I made a new 31 years old attitude goal: Put on my 6-inch platform silver sparkle knee-high Steve Rubell boots and dance along the way of my disco ball drop.  Cause it's gonna be a party all along the way and of course once we scream Happy New Year!  upon arrival of the dream.

Here's to this new year of 31.