I was living in San Diego—blocks from the beach, my outdoor patio table riddled with several bouquets of flowers and a dozen Sprinkles cupcakes (RIP) melting in the sun. It was my 30th birthday and I had the fresh treat-yourself-pedicure and Gucci-bag-splurge to prove it. I felt celebrated. I felt established.

Somehow, that was ten years ago and I now feel five years younger than 30. Girl math?

Seriously, though. I blinked and a whole-ass decade went by. A decade, I now realize, that I had no expectations for. No goals. No hopes. No dreams. I didn’t take out a pen and paper once the clock struck midnight and start making a list of all the things I wanted to accomplish so long as my age started with the number 3, which—admittedly—feels like something I would do.

That turned out to be a good thing—because whatever list I would have made, I can guarantee, would have been moot by month-one. In fact, to look back on such a list after the decade that I’ve managed to actualize would have been depressing. Or comical. But probably depressing.

When I say my 30s were defined by the highest of highs and lowest of lows, that is not hyperbole. My 30s, by all accounts, were the best of times, and the worst of times.

In fact, as I reflected on what it means to flip to 40, I made a list. A list of said high-highs and low-lows that you can download and read if that’s of interest. Not to prove some level of superwoman bad-assery, but to prove what I had guessed (more like guessed wrong) about the 30s after all. See below.

Your 30s is not a decade to have it all together. Yes, big, adult things often happen here, but they’re largely all sorts of chaotic and you’re in a permanent state of figuring-it-out. An essay on HelloGloria.com said it best: “It’s a busy decade full of loss, letdowns, and realizations about what’s real and true.”

God, why was it so busy? I had no idea the things I’d go through. And how laborious most of them were. The physical and mental taxes I paid to be a woman-in-her-30s seems like something I should write my congressman about. Yet, I still managed to experience the irrefutable best days of my life—the 8th anniversary of one (Matt asking me to marry him) being today.

Sure, the frontal lobe may be developed by 30, but it’s by-and-far in a test-drive mode most of the decade. I’m convinced that 40 is when you really get to drive it off the lot.

Which leads me here: just about 40, living in the suburbs of Chicago, debating about which fast casual restaurant with a free-dessert coupon I will go to on the big day! Will I make a list of all the things I want to do this decade? Perhaps. Could be fun. But more than any of those things—i.e., convince my husband to learn to ballroom dance with me, take up a spot in a class or on a team (dance, chorus, basketball, group exercise, a foreign language), go on more long vacations, get a dog again, write more books—I want my middle age to be more middle of the road. Pleasant. Mild. Lovely. I don’t need career defining moments. There will be no more marriages or kids. I’m out of grandparents to have die. I sure hope we can avoid another global pandemic (thank you for seeing yourself out, Hantavirus), and I’m doing my best to block the return of any type of cancer.

When I blink again, and another whole-ass decade goes by (and it will), I hope my 40s feel…under the radar. Not asking for much might be asking too much. But we’ll see.

Happy Birthday, Diva. We made it this far.