It's hard to believe I'm rapidly approaching the age of 30. It wasn't that long ago that being 30 represented the onset of being a mature adult leaning more toward middle age than being a kid. Now that we're only two months away, the date being April 8th to be precise, from changing my first digit from a 2 to a 3, we're changing our tune. 30 isn't that old. While turning 30 may be too old to start off a career in major league baseball, and while I won't set any records for young entrepreneurialship, there's plenty more to do, and I think we've done alright so far.That said, I get to see my two best friends from high school reach 30 tomorrow, in what will be a dry run for me. My friends, who I've been close to for half our lives, since bonding together in 9th grade geekiness, are twins who are just 7 minutes apart. They turned 1 together, 10 together, 20 together, and now, 30. Today, my wife and I drove up 200+ miles or so through Northern California, to Chico, where we had gone to high school, and where their family and many friends still live. While the three of us have gone on to our own jobs and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and the Los Angeles area, some feel much more comfortable in the smaller, slower, Chico - and could be here forever.
Living in fast-paced Silicon Valley might make me look down on the small town routine, but in an odd twist, the hotel we're staying at actually has free highest-speed wireless access (a must for me), meaning I have better Web speeds here, for free, than I did for $14.95 a night in New York last week. Odd how that is. We'll take it and won't complain. In minutes, though, we'll shut the lid on the laptop and join the real world, one of hugs and handshakes and hellos, with pizza and diet Coke galore. That'll be worth today's drive, as you can't replace a lifetime friendship with anonymous hits on a blog.