A Brief & Incomplete List: #9

A Brief & Incomplete List: ways to use the phrase, “We’re 30 Year Old Women”

1) To justify spending $12 on Bulleit Rye Old Fashioneds, instead of $9 on well whiskey at the indie-hipster concert in North Park. Your sister, who is only a 23 year old woman, will have no such justification. Her night will peak when she weaves her way through the crowd, double-fisting PBR tallboys while the crowd serenades her with “PBR Angel,” sung to the tune of ”Beauty School Dropout.” Don’t be jealous. You’re a 30-year old woman; beer and being the center of attention make you queasy anyways.

2) In disbelief when you realize, on your way to brunch the following morning, that the right thigh of your jeans now sports a rather impressive splotch of dried marinara from the save-your-life pizzeria you visited the night before. This is a singular statement of disbelief, (“But… I’M a 30 year old woman...:”) because your person would never leave the house in pizza pants. Luckily, she loves you anyways.

3) To explain why you and your partner have no interest in going dancing on a Sunday night at the Gayborhood’s most happening dance club with your literary friend following a casual, potluck-style drink-and-chat at a classmate’s house. This usage should be accompanied with big smiles and rueful shakes of the head, as if to say, “If only we were younger, if only we were as strong and energetic as you! Of course we’d love to be there, but… we’re 30 year old women.

4) As an excuse for day drinking on the beach that same Sunday, after brunch but before the potluck-style drink-and-chat at said classmate’s house. In this context the phrase comes with an implied “we deserve this” clause. Careful, this particular use walks a fine line between “we deserve this” the day the drinking occurs and “we should have known better” the morning after.

5) As an explanation for why you and your partner need to leave the beach-adjacent bar after taking a quick lap through the pulsing neon lights, and the bass that rattles your glasses’ frames, where the girls in bikinis and cut-off shorts are hip-thrusting the exposed bottoms of their white, white pockets in the general direction of the shirtless men on the rooftop.

6) Basically anytime in any situation because perching upon the precipice of 30 allows you to

both gaze backwards into the void of things you’ve already accomplished or overcome, and peer

indefinitely forward, into the vast expanse of experiences you have yet to encounter.

Take the nap, drink the cocktails, sleep in late, eat the pizza.

You’re a 30 year old woman, goddammit.