it’s called a spade

Nothing feels normal about being thirty because I’ve never been thirty before last year. Nothing feels normal about quitting a salaried job because I’ve never quit a salaried job before this year, nor have I even had a salaried job before last year. Nothing feels normal about eating a minimum of three times a day—six if you’re including snacks—because while I maybe nailed the whole eating thing as a kid, it’s been over a decade since I started failing at it.

Nothing feels normal about being a kid whose parents are divorced because I’ve never been a kid whose parents are divorced. I’ve only been a thirty-year-old whose parents are divorced, so I’m trying to figure out not only how one handles divorce but how one handles divorce as an adult. I wasn’t spared any pain just because I was an adult with an understanding of the definition and reasons behind divorce when I was told, “Mommy and Daddy aren’t going to live together anymore.”

I don’t feel like an adult, and I most certainly don’t feel thirty, at least not the thirty they show in the movies. Just this morning, I was trying to reheat my coffee in a pot over a portable plug-in stove top because I don’t have a microwave; nor do I have a stove, so I bought a plug-in stove top from Goodwill for $7.99. Coffee and bargain-shopping seem adult enough, and I almost gave myself credit for that, but as I started to congratulate myself for acting my age while warming up my morning adult beverage, I got distracted and spilled some of my coffee on the counter.

No big, I thought, and I reached for a paper towel, only to realize I didn’t have any paper towels. So I reached for a dish towel, only to realize I didn’t have any dish towels. So I reached for a hand towel, only to realize I didn’t have any of those either. I looked around my one room of a house (a studio) as I stood in the corner deemed the kitchen and debated using a sock from the corner deemed the laundry room, but something seemingly adult-ish in me told me that using a dirty sock to wipe up the counter might be gross. As I looked around the room, canceling out blankets and beanies as possible candidates to wipe up my slight mess, I looked down at my sweatpants. Before I could even reach the “Aha!” part of my thought, I was lifting my knee to the height of the counter and wiping up the spilled coffee with the sweatpants I was wearing.

Just as I was thinking that I should probably do some kid-friendly adult things today like invest in paper towels, I lost my balance. It’s been a while since I’ve done yoga, and the whole tree pose was never in my favor anyway. I’m more of a downward-dog type person, so I’m not sure what I was thinking while actually taking the time to think while standing on one leg and simultaneously wiping down my counter with the clothes I was wearing; but there I was, thinking, wiping, and dirtying my clothes all in one act, all on one leg. And I almost believed I was the grand master of multitasking, until I lost my balance.

As I started to go down, the knee I was wiping the counter with ended up kneeing the pot my coffee was in, knocking the entire pot over and turning the original tiny spill into Lake Placid there on my countertop. I managed to catch myself before landing on the floor but only at the expense of reaching for the nearest thing in sight to grab for support, which was a rack of clean dishes. Said dishes were no longer clean, and a few of them suffered the same fate as Humpty Dumpty.

While I stood there, looking at the larger mess I had made, I noticed my jar of honey on the counter, soaking in a pool of coffee. I snatched the jar up quickly to wipe it off, as if the coffee was going to ruin the jar, only to remember seconds after my snatching that I didn’t have anything to wipe it off with. I looked around the room again as if a second look was going to give me a different outcome. I canceled out all the same possible candidates as before, looked down at my sweatpants, and looked at the mess caused by my sweatpants’ inability to effectively clean anything. Not wanting to go through that whole charade again, I began licking my jar of honey.

This was me cleaning.

“Really, JJ,” I said to myself as I realized what I was doing. “Thirty? Is this what thirty-year-olds do when they make a mess?”

What do thirty-year-olds do when they make a mess? Do thirty-year-olds even make messes? I’m sure they at least have paper towels.

So you can see, I don’t feel like an adult. I don’t feel like I’m thirty. I have eight months of experience being thirty, and while it might seem like I should be further along in having this thirty-year-old stuff figured out, especially since I’m only heading into more thirties, in the grand scheme of things eight months isn’t a lot of time.

I was twenty-eight years old when I was first told about my parents separating. Up to that point, I had twenty-eight years of experience being the by-product of a married couple. And sure, my parents would say I was more to them than a mere by-product of their relationship, but for fact’s sake, my frame of reference for twenty-eight years had been from the standpoint of a kid whose parents, maybe not always happy, were nonetheless married.