A Brand Spankin' New Passport

I had to get a new passport this summer. Contrary to the theme of this blog, I did not find any humor or enjoyment in this process at all. Getting the new passport meant two things to me:
1) Without stamps and "weatheredness" (yes, I just made that word up) my trips to lands afar would be reduced to ashes. Ok, not really ashes. Perhaps I am being just a wee bit dramatic here, but you get my point.
2) I am almost 30. ! This was, and still is,  actually more traumatic than having to surrender Old Blue Faithful. Three decades of life is what I have been dreading since the day I turned 21 when I sat in a heap on my couch and sobbed at the stroke of midnight because 21 meant there were only nine good years left. (I am not being dramatic here, although I wish I was. This actually happened). And now, with one little expiration date on one little blue book that I use once a year or so, I could no longer skirt the issue. I must face my resistance to a new book AND a new (old) age.

It is not that I thought the renewal process would be particularly difficult. It is just that I was loathe to surrender the passport that I have had since 1999, at the ripe age of 19. At that time, the ten year expiration date seemed a distant event.   2009? That wasn't until the next century!  However, July 19 of this year crept up on me like a thief trying to steal said passport and I strategically began plotting how I could retain my old one. If I had just researched the topic more thoroughly, I would have known that my old one would be sent back to me. Instead, I was plotting ways that I could report it stolen, lost, or just "forget" to turn in the old one. That little book had hiked with me through the Andes, languished in the possession of an Indian immigration officer, and scaled the Great Wall of China. I don't have children, but I felt as if I was getting rid of one of them. How would you like to exchange one of your children for a new one? You wouldn't if you are at all a nice person.

My new one came by mail shortly after I applied for it and the old one followed suit thereafter. My only consolation is that I look almost the same at 29  as I did at 19. And that is something to be happy about!