Around 2018, I made a goal for myself: I wanted to visit all seven continents by the time I hit 50. Why 2018? Well, I went to Antarctica in 2018. I figured that I had the hard one already, so I should probably do the rest, right?
Then there was a pandemic, so my progress toward that goal had to go dormant for a while. However, I finally got my penultimate continent (Africa) in 2024.
I finally got my seventh continent by landing in Australia yesterday. And I turned 50 today.
Sometime in the mid-aughts, I decided that I didn’t really want gifts or a party for my birthday. I didn’t even really want to make friends and family celebrate my birthday. I decided that the only one who needed to celebrate me was me. I don’t usually celebrate myself; I spend too much time bouncing around in my brain. And the thing I wanted most on my birthday was to engage with the world, to celebrate this place, where I managed to live another year.
Furthermore, I decided part of that was that I should always do things I’d never done before on my birthday. Go travel someplace new, go eat something new, go be surprised by the world. It didn’t have to be anything big; if I was in town in Minneapolis, I’d challenge myself to find things I’d never done that had been right under my nose this whole time. Visit a new-to-me museum, restaurant, shop… whatever.
On my birthday in past years, I walked up to the Cliffs of Moher with a broken leg, saw Prince’s shoe collection at Paisley Park, saw a rainbow over Antarctica, and unexpectedly had the staff of the Spam Museum sing happy birthday to me. I’ve eaten Uzbek food, chased wild dolphins in a boat, sat in a NYC hotel room and watched Scorsese win his first Oscar. I saw Elton John play Madison Square Garden for the last time. I went to the Humane Society just to pet groggy dogs post-surgery. I drank tequila shots with my mom. I had a toga party.
Somehow, I’ve made it through my first half-century. To celebrate that, I drove across Tasmania and hung out with a colony of little penguins.
I’ve been very lucky to be able to do these things, and I am thankful. Every time I indulge myself like this, I try to bring it back to the world in some way. Maybe someone will smile at a photo, learn a new thing, or even decide to make their own adventure. If you are reading this, thank you for coming with me.
This is 50.
