My 30th birthday was yesterday and it was fantastic. I am so grateful to my family and friends who made my day special. Now I want to set some goals, or at least try and write out my thoughts and get a sense of direction so that I can do that.

1. I need to decide what to do with my writing. I’m going to try and figure that out this week. I write. I studied creative writing in college. I’ve been in magazines and have a chapbook published. What should I do in my 30s? More magazines? Hopefully try to get the chapbooks I’ve written in the past two years sent off to some potential publishers? Try to get a full length book published? Do I want to self publish? What do I need to do to feel satisfied with my 30s when I turn 40? Where do I need to be? 
2. I want the wonderful magazine I edit to grow and to support more excellent writers. I get more pleasure out of reading the writing that comes into my inbox for the magazine than anyone knows. Not all of it is right for the magazine, either because it isn’t polished and ready or because the style or subject just doesn’t fit. But I’m grateful to read all of it, and it gives me a thrill to hit publish on a story or poem that I really like. I started the magazine at a decent pace and then put it aside for awhile because of health, hectic living, and travel. Now I’m back. I really want to build it up.
3. I want to homeschool successfully. It is very important to me not to send Angelica to public school, and while we will consider private school, ideally we will give her her education at home. This fall has been the beginning of our homeschooling journey. But for the next decade (and beyond) school will be in earnest. It is my goal to give my daughter a personalized education suiting her interests and at a pace that works for her. I want her to enjoy learning as much as possible, and to develop the character and discipline to learn the things she needs to learn even when she doesn’t want to. My emphasis though is on tailoring everything to her interests and abilities. I don’t want her to have the mass produced, cookie cutter education of the public schools. I am making a commitment to making education a part of our daily lives, whether we are sitting down at the table formally with sums, or learning about ecosystems from a Netflix documentary, or about post modernism at the art museum. I want this to be interesting and organic for Angelica.
4. Today I am committing to giving more of my time to learning something new. I love nonfiction books, coursera, edX, and MIT open courseware. I adore documentaries. But I’m not always focused. I want to make a more conscious effort to spend regular time absorbing new information. I recently bought a book about the history of syphilis and its effects on various historical figures. I’m also studying a book about the changing structure and politics of the family throughout the long middle ages.
5. My 30s should be a decade of art. I paint a lot and I do digital collage. I’d like to branch off into other things too. I’m not an artist. I suck. But it’s therapeutic to creative visual art, and it renews my mind for my writing. Never be ashamed of being creative, whether the outcome of that creativity impresses other people or not. I like to share it because it is cathartic, but it’s for me – I don’t do it for other people.
6. I want to travel. We’ve traveled this year and I want to do more.

I am going to keep thinking. I feel like I need more or different goals. Most of this is a continuation of or recommitment to things I already do. I feel like there should be something new in my 30s. I just like the life I have now though.