Your 30s are a decade of major milestones and surprising setbacks. Do you sometimes wake up and wonder if your true adult life is just across the country? If you’ll ever have the confidence to roast a whole chicken for a dinner party atop a fully accessorized dining table?
Illustrator and author Ariella Elovic, BFA ’13, who is 34, has spent the past four years investigating (and being plagued by) these questions, and she writes with a revelation: The truth is, 30 (and beyond) isn’t about finally feeling settled. It’s about understanding that life is in the in-between.
In these pages, Elovic presents an array of disorienting, thrilling, disappointing, funny and grounding experiences, offering ways she’s been able to find “richness in the flailing.” Despite all that we’ve been told, our 30s are actually made more valuable by not having everything figured out.