Turning Thirty

The constant drip gave way to a steady stream off the corner of the tattered tarp suspended above my sore body. Everything felt damp: my sleeping bag, my clothes, and most certainly my mood. Suddenly, a shrill squeaking interrupted the rain’s drumming and my miserable thoughts. A squirrel stationed itself a couple feet away, brandished its sopping deflated tail by twitching it rapidly above its head, and yipped repeatedly at me through the rain. It seemed as irate about my existence as I did. 

It was the final day of a compulsory week-long wilderness excursion. But before I could retreat to the dry indoors I had to endure a 24-hour solo day, intended for seeking God in seclusion with prayer and fasting. However, I wasn’t praying. I was too upset with God for the rain, for my exhaustion, for the mess of my life in the woods and in the wake of my freshman year of college. I had all but abandoned the rules-based faith of my high school self and was clamoring down a broad road away from God’s Word. Praying and bible-reading were not on my mind, rodents and rain were. Desperately lonely, ridden with guilt, and unsure of my future, I didn’t know how on earth I’d survive the day alone. Eventually, the squirrel relented; the time passed; and I left the forest. I took away only one resolution from the day: I’d never willing seek solitude in the wet woods again.

I languished in anger and regret on that rainy day the summer before I turned 20 because my life looked nothing at all like I wanted. This existential crisis seemed to have come a decade early. Sitcoms had taught me such disillusionment was reserved for turning thirty. I had watched on Friends Rachel breakdown over not crossing off from her list of life goals being married and having children by the time she turned 30. Phoebe likewise despairs when she failed to finish all her objectives. Monica responds by getting drunk and declaring, “I turned thirty today and I can do anything I want because I’m a grown-up.” Ross buys a sports car to assure himself he is still young. To console Rachel, Ross rips two candles from her cake to say she still has time. Time to attain something, anything to prove her life isn’t being wasted. Such typifications taught me that thirty was to be scorned if one hadn’t secured actualization by this birthday.

Despite the rocky start to my twenties, I nevertheless naively determined that I would not succumb to such anxieties by reaching thirty accomplished, renown and grown-up. My plan was simple: complete one easy to fulfill goal that inspired awe and silenced doubt by the close of my twenties. Inspired by JD on Scrubs hilariously failing to complete a triathlon on his 30th birthday, I decided to do what he couldn’t. The farthest I had run was 3 or so miles when I hatched this plan, but I figured I had a decade to pull off an iron man.

Yet a couple months out from the infamous birthday, I still couldn’t find a triathlon that fit into my schedule, let alone 140.6 miles of swimming, biking, and running. I had lost four triathlon seasons to earning a Masters of Arts in linguistics. I spent another season traveling with my husband across country on a motorcycle to celebrate paying off our student loans. Now in the months leading up to thirty, any training was interrupted by finally getting a half-sleeve tattoo, which I had been designing and researching since I was 21. Alas, procrastination had robbed me of sprinting through the ribbon by thirty. 

If being a triathlete was out, perhaps I could still celebrate with some grandiose party or treating myself to an awe-inspiring vacation. Maybe I’d host a Gatsby style gala in my honor or take a cruise to Antartica. I reassured myself that I still had several months and didn’t need to figure it out just then, putting off thoughts of thirty just as I had for the past decade. However, indecision turned to mourning that I would not do or accomplish anything substantial to mark this occasion.

I had imagined that turning thirty would be this glorious rite of passage into adulthood. With fanfare and confetti, I’d walk into my thirties as acclaimed and well on my way to exquisitely executing my well defined life goals. Yet I spent the final year of my twenties unemployed, still trying to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up. No prestigious career, no peer accolades, no glory of elite achievement. Rachel’s lament and JD’s folly now hit an unfunny chord. I too had come to believe that 30 was the due date for proof of adulthood. But I was arriving at 30 not only without a triathlon medal but wholly unprepared and overwhelmed. Therefore, at 11PM on my thirtieth birthday eve, I frantically googled ideas for how to celebrate the next day. 

On September 19th, 1986 Rich Lawrence rushed his wife, Sharon, to the hospital a couple of blocks from their home in Monroeville, PA. She had gone into labor with excruciating pain and a fever of 100.8 degrees. Her third trimester had been riddled with illness and premature labors, but this time there was no stalling. Dismayed, Rich followed as they hurried Sharon into the operating room for an emergency C-section. For over an hour, the surgeon struggled to free the infant. At last, I was born, silent, hind first, and covered in meconium. I let out a brief, weak cry before the doctors rushed me out of the surgical room with none of the usual ceremonies. In the critical care nursery, they told my father I was having breathing problems and was in critical condition; they advised him to make final plans. Immediately he called our priest to the hospital so that I could be baptized before I died. With the aid of a nurse and a vile of water, Father Whalon and my dad baptized me by sprinkling three drops of sterile water on the only part of my body not covered in sensors and tubes, my left knee. Within an hour of my baptism, I made an astonishing complete recovery. Word of the miracle baby spread throughout the pediatric unit, and over the next week staff from across the hospital would drop in to see me in my father’s arms. My mom’s recovery was much slower. She had begun hemorrhaging after surgery, stopped breathing, and received the last rites from Father Whalon. After a week on a respirator and three transfusions, she took breaths on her own and held her baby girl for the first time. I had been unable to do anything to help myself, but God in His mercy and compassion saved me on that day 30 years ago.

God continued to watch over me when I played, rebelled or suffered as a child. When in the depression of my preteens I sought to end the life He had preserved, He graciously spared me again. When at 14 I fully understood the cost of my sin was death, God saved my soul by showing me Christ had died in my place.  When at 19 I abandoned His Word, He brought me back. When my father passed away, He sustained me. When we moved across the country, He guided us and provided for us. When the IBS I had struggled with all my life threatened to undo me, He fully healed me of all my digestive issues. Indeed, every year of my life, every breath I have breathed, is because of Him who loves me and gave up His Son for my sake. God alone deserved to be celebrated at my arrival to thirty.

Yet You are He who took me from the womb;

You made me trust You at my mother's breasts.

On You was I cast from my birth,

and from my mother's womb You have been my God.

Psalm 22:9-10

At 8AM on my thirtieth birthday, I embarked in our mud splattered Subaru to the Central Cascade Mountains for a solo hike. The wipers swept steadily across the windshield parting the persistent precipitation. The deluge didn’t let up as I climbed the trail turned stream from the water run off. When at last I reached my destination of the forest fire lookout, it was shut-up for the winter offering no shelter to the downpour. Dense fog hid any vistas, and soaked surfaces left no where to rest. Not even a squirrel stirred on the solitary summit as tiny beads of hail fell in the brisk wind. 

Rather than disappointment or regret, a calmness came over my soul. God kindly convicted me that I had spent so much time fretting over what I had not accomplished that I had lost sight of Him who accomplished it all. In the gale, He tenderly reminded me of dangers, toils, and snares He had brought me safely through thus far. He called to my mind how Christ became man, lived the perfect life I could not, died the death I deserved, and rose from the grave in victory over sin and death. In light of all that He had done, I could only pour out my praise, singing loudly against the thick mist. As we communed, the rain thoroughly drenched me. Once soaked through, any fear of being wet was removed and I was able to joyfully abandon myself to jumping in puddles and delighting in the day.