Almost ‘trentahin’ thing
A few days from now, I will no longer be 29, and the thought of turning 30 feels heavier than I expected.
Being on the verge of becoming a “trentahin” feels like being trapped between two contrasting worlds—what I once imagined for myself and what I have actually become. There are paths I followed with conviction and others I abandoned out of fear, comfort, or simple exhaustion. I doubt my decisions, not because they were wrong, but because they were final in ways I did not fully understand then.
As 30 approaches, I begin to understand accountability in a deeper way. Every choice I made in my 20s lines up behind me, asking to be acknowledged, not all of them ready to be defended. This is the age when the “what could have beens” and “if onlys” start to linger longer than expected. Yet it is also the stage where I am forced to live with the consequences of my actions and learn how to move forward without denial.
There is a quiet loneliness in knowing that I have repeatedly delayed taking the Licensure Examination for Teachers (LET), weighed down by time constraints and the pressure of committing to journalism while entering law school at the same time. Each time I come across congratulatory posts celebrating the passers of the past three LET examinations, a nauseating mix of jealousy and regret settles in. It is easier to blame my circumstances, but the truth is more uncomfortable: this is the result of my complacency and failure to plan ahead. I was caught in the illusion that I still had enough time—to prepare, to file my documents, to catch up later. In doing so, I failed to account for the demands of law school and my journalism commitments, ignored the steadily ticking deadlines, and ultimately paid the price for that neglect.
Approaching 30 also forces me to change my once teenage-like fallacy of measuring love through grand gestures, believing it had to be loud, consuming, and unquestionable to be real. I learned this the hard way in a rushed relationship that eventually turned toxic. It was my first real attempt at romance, one that failed because I was still grasping at what love was supposed to look like, mistaking chaos for passion and attachment for depth.
I did not know then that love could exist in the quiet—in staying gentle when it is easier to react, in choosing consistency over drama, in caring without the need to be seen. Now, love feels more like presence than performance, more about remembering, listening, and staying when things are ordinary. It no longer needs to prove itself; it simply needs to be steady and sincere.
I have found love countless times beyond romance—it revealed itself in quiet constancy, in shared silences, and in moments that asked for nothing in return. I saw it when, despite her packed schedule and our looming examinations, a classmate gave me Tylenol after I stubbornly showed up to class burning with a 38.7-degrees-Celsius fever. I felt it during long night drives around Kalumala Heights with my longtime friends from work, the city lights blurring past us as we traded stories about days that had worn us thin. Love lingers, too, in between friendly banter and liquor-fueled rants about law school with my fellow students. And I found the loudest kind of love on my campus journalists, who risked their grades and gave up their holidays for press work and training, choosing to become the voices of their fellow students even when it cost them comfort and rest.
What unsettles me most at 29 is the quiet self-imposed comparison between my life and the invisible timelines of others. Success seems louder elsewhere, anywhere but my life. I believe it is ordinary for most of us to have this existential crisis phase. There are nights I spend overthinking if I am making something worthwhile out of my fleeting time on earth. I feel like my life is idle, and my efforts and time are slowly wasting away. But one glance at my current life, and I am assured that I am taking things at my own pace.
As 30 draws closer, there is also a strange calm beneath the unease. Being at a crossroads means I am not trapped; it means there are still choices left to make. Maybe these doubts are not warnings, but invitations—to live more deliberately, to forgive past versions of myself, and to accept that clarity is rarely complete. If this is what standing at the edge of 30 feels like, then perhaps it is not an ending, but a quiet beginning that asks me to choose with open eyes.
In a way, I can say being 29 is an amalgamation of my past actions and the looming dread of an uncertain future. At 29, I already feel the weight of becoming what I once only imagined. The future no longer feels distant; it feels close enough to demand answers. And I am willing to give them, one day, one mistake, one learning at a time.
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Alduz Clark Viray, 29, is an aspiring lawyer.
