Rebecca Barry: Officially grown-up according to plan

Rebecca Barry

My friend went to a wedding at Easter and I went to a birthday party. My event was better than hers because we had a treasure hunt and swung on the rope swing and when we woke up I had a marshmallow egg squashed to my face. It was a great 30th.

I'm thinking I might just kill two birds and get married on my 30th, which gives me four months to extract a proposal, and while I'm at it, buy a baby and give birth to a house. Then I can be done with just the one party and get on with being mature, discussing interest rates, how to get pesto out of the sisal, the weather.

At my parents' for dinner recently, just after I passed the pepper, Dad said, have you thought about freezing your eggs? I chewed casually for a few seconds, suddenly imagined I was eating a special omelette, and said, no, and I can't imagine why you'd ask such a thing. Can I have chocolate crackles for pudding?

But the stem cell advancements to delay menopause sound mighty tempting. If it means I can have my 30th at Cobb & Co and put off adulthood until I'm 40, then please, pass the Petri dish too.

A wise woman once said that when you turn 30, you are an official grown-up, and if you're a Generation X- or Y-er, you must rally the troops to ensure the transition is marked with as much fanfare as possible while simultaneously denying your age. In my parents' day they were too busy raising families to have big parties, let alone worry about ways to taunt Darwin. They were adults at 21, whereas my generation celebrated that milestone by downing as much beer as possible. Are we any wiser now? Some of us might have careers, kids and mortgages but we also have Playstations, no sense of war and a taste for having it all, even if the recession tries to defy us. No wonder women wishing for offspring in their post-yardie years might consider prolonging the life of their ovaries by using science non-fiction to develop their eggs.

Speaking of eggs, the Easter 30th was pretty grown-up now I think about it. We spent two nights in a beautiful, tree-lined campground that our host had booked weeks earlier. Sitting at the outdoor table that night it occurred to me that not only had everyone brought enough food to feed the entire camp, no one had turned up with a bag of white bread from the petrol station and two frozen Sizzlers. We'd engaged in forward planning, a skill that didn't exist for most of my 20s beyond filling the chilly bin with Lindauer and ice. Our plastic plates were overflowing with marinated lamb shanks, kumara salad and breads, our cups with more wine than we knew what to do with (eventually we found a way). One couple had even baked a dessert, another had thought to bring candles to adorn the dinner table.

The following day, after whitebait fritters for breakfast at the Jafakana markets, we got on a bus to take us around the region's vineyards - and not only did no one get so sloshed they couldn't talk during the wine tasting, but everybody paid attention. In fact one chin-stroker in the group noted that not one person sniggered or whispered to the person next to them. It was quite unlike anything I'd attended before.

I like the concept that celebrating your 30th is a recognition of life skills, in this case in a look-how-I've come-to-appreciate-the-finer-things-including-tents-and-ablution-blocks kind of way. Much like the birthday dinner I attended last year, when a mate's chef friend (plus a couple of others playing sous chefs) prepared a five-course meal at his flat. All it took was $20 each and a bottle of vino.

They're not always so sophisticated and I like that too. A few friends are celebrating their fourth decade by announcing to the world they don't care what it thinks of them anymore. One has posted an "inappropriate" photograph on Facebook, faux-pregnant, wine in hand, ciggy in mouth. Another is threatening to shoot a gas cylinder out of a bonfire, a la Savage Honeymoon.

As the guys nonchalantly go from boys to men, Amazon is awash with horrible books about the big three-oh, aimed at women. I hope my panic is out of the way - that mysteriously occurred at 27 when the realisation of mortality kicked in - because I am strangely looking forward to turning 30; the good food, the wine, the bouncy castle in the backyard. By then I will be amazingly fit and toned with a wardrobe full of ball gowns and tiaras. I'll be rich, having read the book and attended the seminar.

Best of all, I'll be exactly where the 10-year-old me thought I'd be at 30: a famous ballerina with a pet chimp, a house under the sea and a future mini-me in the freezer. Four months to go. I think I can make it.