Being 30 is...Scary? Enlightening?

Being 30 was something I have feared my entire life.  I have always been under the impression that life ended after your mid twenties.  My entire life leading up to my 25th birthday showed me that men leave their wives after they got to a certain age and traded them in for newer models.  I have the media, movies, TV, my father to thank for this.  Not to mention the 6 month stint I did in the "strip club" industry (I did not DANCE, I waitressed thank you).  I have always thought that men were like muscle cars and women were like Japanese imports.  Men increase in value as they age.  Women decrease.  I really need to stop that kind of thinking.  I look younger than a lot of people that are younger than me and my father can shove the comment he made when he told me no one wanted to talk to a 30 year old promo girl. 

(I'm sorry - I don't think this looks like someone in their 30's...)

I never gave any thought to my 30's except I didn't want to be in them.  If I could have just paused time and lived life between 26 and 29 I would have thanked God or praised the Devil - which ever one did it for me...
I wanted to live my life with naivety, I wanted to live in Never, Never Land with Peter Pan and the Lost Boys.  I wanted to drink and party my life away without responsibility.  I wanted to live life with the ability to jump in to anything with both feet without looking or considering the consequences. I wanted to dance on bar tops and drink till 4 am.  To dress like it was Halloween every day of my life.  SERIOUS was a very bad word to me.
I've been fighting 30 for the last 3 almost 4 years.  Fighting it HARD and resisting with everything I had. 
Until I met, dated, loved and things ended with GC. 
**NO this isn't about HIM again.**
He made me take a good hard look at myself.  I think that is why I put him on such a high pedestal.  Why I over looked all of his shortcomings, why I overlooked SO MUCH.  He was that person that finally made me want to turn my life around.  To get rid of the whoreish Vegas costumes.  To want to settle down.  To actually WANT to be a better, smarter, calmer person. 
Thirty Four is looming ahead of me and its coming at a speed that is going a little too fast for me, and while I am trying my hardest to think of it as JUST A NUMBER and not freak out about it, its getting a little hard.
I would love to be able to jump into situations without thinking.  Fall in love with reckless abandonment, still with the belief that I would get my Disney Fairytale Ending.  I wish I could wear my heart on my sleeve again - however I've learned that I need to keep it locked away.  I used to believe that the way to get over someone would be to get under someone else and drink myself senseless.  I thought alcohol numbed the pain. 
In my 30's - the wise person that I have become in the last 2 weeks or so (actually its my friends wisdom that I'm actually listening to now) will not go crazy in Cherry Creek looking for bartenders to occupy my time so I don't have to deal with being by myself.  I will listen to the words "he doesn't want anything serious" when a friend says they've got a guy to introduce me to.  I won't think - "well, maybe that will change with time and I'll be that person that changes his mind" - I'll run as far away and as fast as I can from that person as I possibly can.  If they want to run after me - well that's their prerogative - they can chase after me with a 4 carat diamond princess cut set in platinum.  I have a weakness for sparkly things so that might get my attention.  I will stop trying to seek approval from people who do not make me feel good about myself, and the next person who asks me to write a blog about being a 30 year old party girl will receive a bloody nose, black eye and the finger.  I'm not that person anymore and think of myself as more than that bitch.  I'm a good looking girl with skills that have allowed me a lot of free stuff but I'm more than that and if you don't see that then Fuck You.  I don't want any part of you in my life.  I won't feel like a 3rd, 5th or 7th wheel anymore.  I'm dating myself right now and that's all you need to know.  When some guy can show me that his ego, wants and needs come after mine, then that's the guy I'll date.  My heart is mine for me alone now and I am falling in love with this great person that I've started to get to know.  It took my friends here to introduce me to this person and I'm discovering that person totally great.