Turning Thirty

So I just finished Mike Gayle’s book “Turning Thirty” and I thought that it would be good to share my thirtieth birthday story. Given that it was a few years ago I think that it is far enough in the past top be shared and that while it does involve work, hopefully the extenuating circumstances are enough that it won’t impact my career prospects. Actually, given everything else that has happened between then and now I have a feeling that this story is the least of my worries.
(Before I get to it, I really encourage you to pick up a Mike Gayle novel. I know that most people assume that what I read is challenging and dense and for the most part it is but this is really interesting and quick and fun. It’s also a lot like what I would be like if I grew up British. He’s worth a read.)
Anyway, my thirtieth birthday came very shortly after leaving B-School. I had just moved to KC two months prior and I did not know a soul in the entire town. Ok, that’s not entirely true. I knew maybe a half dozen people and I knew none of them well enough to ask them to go out drinking on a Wednesday night since it would be the last night of my twenties. Given that the majority of people that I did know by name at that time were bartenders I decided that I could not stay in the night before I turned thirty and made my way, by myself, to Kelly’s.
Kelly’s is what can nicely be described as an upscale dive bar. Meaning that it can be popular and crowded on the weekends but on a random Wednesday in September when no one is there you really begin to see what the place actually looks like. Honestly, that night I didn’t really care. I just wanted to find out how to change my focus from “I’m turning thirty and I’m alone in Kansas City” to “I’m turning thirty.” That took a couple of drinks and then I started thinking about doing a birthday shot. And since I knew that my heart was with my friends in South Bend that I had to do a red headed slut. Except that I didn’t know what was in one and neither did the bartender. This had me running through my phonebook and going who would know and realizing “Super would know.” Which of course he did and for a moment it did feel like it was Linebacker West.
Eventually I called it a night and while I was a little worse for wear I was still functional. Had to be because I had to go to work the next day and spend my thirtieth birthday in a cubicle. (Yes, I certainly know how to live the good life.) But that was ok since I only had one meeting and that was going to be a big department meeting where I could sit in the back and veg out. Or so I thought as I walked into a meeting, still complaining about how bright it was outside.
See, they served us lunch at the meeting so as I got into line to eat someone stepped in line behind. Technically, it was the CFO. Who then sat down next to me at the same table. Which meant that I suddenly had to turn on my best behavior while all the time wondering “Do I smell like a bar right now?” I survived it, made my usual intelligent points and realized that this was going to be one of those moments that when they give me a career retrospective will be brought up and discussed in great detail. Along with the time I had to race to a meeting, barely making it in time, because I had overslept after attending a New Pornographers show the night before. And somehow I don’t think they would have been happy knowing that my answer to “Why are you late?” would have been “I was hanging out with The New Pornographers last night.”
The five random CD’s of the week
1) Various Artists “Down to the Promised Land”
2) Kelly Willis “What I Deserve”
3) John Wesley Harding “The Confessions of St. Ace”
4) Tori Amos “From the Choirgirl Hotel”
5) Paula Cole “This Fire”
(One day when I build my time machine I’m going to go back to the moment when I buy a Paula Cole CD and I’m going to wait outside the store. And the second that I walk out that door I’m going to kick my own ass and go “Get some taste you moron.”)