Thirty

I'm thirty now.

I'm not entirely sure how I feel about that. Birthdays have a way of making you take stock, whether you want to or not, and thirty feels like one of those numbers that demands reflection. So here I am, looking back at the last ten years of my life, trying to make sense of what's happened and what hasn't.

The truth is, I haven't done much. Not in the way society measures these things, anyway. But I've changed, I think. And maybe that counts for something.

When I was twenty, I was still gaming constantly. That slowed down somewhere in my early twenties, not all at once but gradually. I'm not entirely sure why. Maybe I just needed something else, something more. But before I let go of it entirely, I discovered Skyrim, and for a while there, I binged that game harder than I'd binged anything before. Modded it to hell and back. It felt important at the time, like I was creating something, even if it was just for myself.

Around the same time (actually, a little before) I discovered My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. I was eighteen, almost nineteen, and I know how that sounds. But it became a huge part of my life. It still is. I got deep into the fandom, started writing fanfiction, found a community that felt like home in ways I hadn't expected. For years, that show and that community were central to who I was.

And then somewhere along the way, between writing fanfiction and tinkering with websites and losing myself in code, I realized something: I didn't want to be a developer. Not really. I was good at it, gotten better over the years, learned more, built more. But my heart wasn't in it. What I wanted, what I'd always wanted without fully realizing it, was to be a writer. An artist. Someone who creates stories and worlds and meaning, not just code and websites.

In 2019, Friendship is Magic ended. That hurt more than I expected it to. It felt like the close of something bigger than just a TV show. And when G5 started, I tried to care, I really did, but Hasbro fumbled it so badly that I couldn't hold on. Watching something you love get mishandled is its own kind of grief.

So that's been the last ten years. Gaming less, discovering ponies, writing fanfiction, playing Skyrim, improving at web development while simultaneously realizing I don't want it to be my life, and watching my favorite show end. Not much of a highlight reel, is it?

But here's the thing: right around my thirtieth birthday, a few small things have happened that feel significant in their own way.

I've gotten back into Minecraft lately, something I haven't touched in years. It's been surprisingly grounding to build and explore again. And I published Under Rolling Stars II, the sequel I'd been working on for so long. It's out there now, on FiMFiction.

Maybe the next ten years will be different. Maybe I'll do more, be more, accomplish more of the things that matter. Or maybe I'll just keep writing, keep creating, keep trying to figure out who I am and what I want.

Either way, I'm thirty now. And I think that's okay.