It's the New 30. Or the New Black. Whatever.

Rachel's Topic: Turning 40 (in Three Years)

When you're young, there are certain milestones you look forward to: driving age, voting age, drinking age, the novelty of 30. I'm even looking forward to my fifties when I can let my hair go until it turns into the beautiful snowy white my mom had when she was that age.

In the meantime, I keep experiencing the milestones you don't really celebrate. This usually involves the realization that certain things have passed you by. You're really too old to develop the skills that could win you an Olympic medal. You're too old to qualify for an MTV reality show. And then you're too old to even enjoy watching them anymore because those kids are just ridiculous. You suddenly realize your parents were right about a lot of things (what I call The Adult-Child Epiphany) and it's time to plan seriously for retirement. The clothes you wore in your youth are back in style, but you know you would look foolish trying them out for this second go-round. No one ever looked good in neon anyway.

We're all aware of the passage of time. Remember when you were young and it seemed like Christmas would never come? Now it seems the days fly by, almost without note. I know it's coming. Every now and again someone in my group of high school friends will bring it up and we'll talk about it in incredulous tones. I'm hoping it will be novel, like our thirtieth birthdays. Maybe we'll take a special trip to celebrate (I vote for a cruise) and talk about how fabulous we still are. Because we are.

No, I'm not too worried about turning 40. Now, turning 41, that's a different story.