So what is the very last column I write in my 30s supposed to be about, anyway? All the stuff I’ve learned up to now? All the mistakes I’ve made and how I’ve grown from them? Bleah. That’s so boring.

I must warn you, this column contains obnoxious gender stereotypes that used to make me seethe and fume and growl and shoot lasers from my feminist eyeballs. Then I had kids. Sons, to be specific. And the last 11 years of raising sons have left me totally incapable of even pretending that gender stereotypes don’t have a firm basis in fact.

There is nothing like family to make you really appreciate your friends.

A few weeks ago, after a long run, I walked up to the passenger side of my car, opened the door and then stared for several seconds at the completely unfamiliar contents of the vehicle.

I will be 39 years old in one week, and I am here to tell you that I do not see how that is even remotely possible.

My brain is a fun house. I have a weird, killer memory when it comes to recalling conversations, numbers, any and all dates, trivia about who was wearing what and when and where. I don’t know why I know. I just know. I don’t even have to try.

So here is a topic that never crossed my mind, even in passing, during my entire 37 years on this planet until it became the center of the universe in the last six months: golf.

Sitting on the front stoop of our house in the dusk of late August, my son and I watched a white cat saunter up the driveway toward us. And then we realized, as the little creature got closer, that the cat was a dog.

June 6, 1985. My mother circled the date on the calendar, informing me that from that moment forward, I would no longer be on her payroll.

Dakota Knighten showed up at a Young Marines orientation 14 months ago sporting baggy pants, a sideways cap and a defiant attitude.