You may find yourself Letting the days go by as I approach 30 BY CAITLIN SHETTERLY

Last week, I spent an entire afternoon comparison-shopping in South Portland for the most energy-efficient-plus-cheapest air conditioner to accommodate the hot box I’m crashing in for the month of July. I drove back and forth between Home Depot and Best Buy, Target and Circuit City, calculating in my mind the total effect of square feet and low ceilings; a hot room with a solitary window vs. the complete darkness which would descend once the unit was in place.

Finally, a Best Buy installed with the help of copious amounts of duct tape and cardboard, my cat now one chill kitty, I took off for the weekend to direct a show in Stonington at a 24-hour-play festival.

At our first meeting, the combined NYC and Maine talent lent the air a healthy vibe of ambition, plus just a touch of the competitive spirit. The writers and directors arrived first. And then the actors straggled in, all looking "mussy-perfect" in the wet Island weather.

I turned and looked over my shoulder and let my eye fall on an actor whose beauty was almost shocking. He had one of those completely uniform second-day stubble things going on, a light tan, dark hair that could be casually pushed out of his eyes every so often, and long, almost-feminine limbs. This is the kind of Brando-white-T-shirt actor whom you see and understand why they take to the stage: They have to do almost nothing to be captivating. My second thought was "Jesus, he’s like 23," followed by "way too young for me," which was then followed by "oh my God, I just thought someone is too young for me."

I was, suddenly, and for the first time, at a crossroads I didn’t want to be at. As 30 looms closer every day, I find myself vacillating between denial and "just happen already." In Stonington, I chose blind ignorance.

Some twenty-ish guys are mature . . . right?

Before long, Skinny Perfect and I were flashing light-filled eyes and wondering out loud if we’d met before and, if so — where? He thought maybe I’d have a better idea if I checked out his resume, which informed me not only that he had gone to Harvard as an undergrad but also that he was currently enrolled as an Acting MFA student.

People from Harvard can never wait more than 10 minutes before outing themselves.

As the theater team assembled for a cocktail meet and greet, and as Skinny Perfect Harvard and I strained for things to say to each other, I looked across the room and noticed a dark-haired musician with tea-colored eyes — clad in jeans and a T-shirt, an earring in each ear — zipping up his guitar case before making his way toward the food area, where I was consuming deviled eggs at an alarming rate. I think he said something about mayonnaise and eggs not really going together in his mind, and before I knew it the Musician and I had begun a repartee about everything from celery to the Red Sox, the definition of a slide guitar to Israel vs. Palestine. It was so easy, I almost didn’t notice I was meeting someone new. As I laughed at his jokes, I noticed a few grays sifted in through his full head of dark curly hair, which contrasted with a relatively young face. I thought, "early-to-mid thirties, for sure."

So began a weekend of looking over my shoulder at Cute and Twenty and straight ahead at Thirty and Oh My God I Can Actually Talk to This Person. The whole thing made me totally tense, you know, because as I strained to make Cute Perfect Skinny Harvard Twenty more interesting, Musician Thirty Oh My God became so much more cool and way, way more funny, and, O.M.G., I almost couldn’t stand it. Like, you know?

Unbeknownst to me, the New York crowd began scheming to get Musician Brooklyn Oh My God and me together. Sometimes you gotta just hand it to other people and let them make these decisions for you. So I went with it.

At the weekend wrap party he kissed me. Tentatively. In that one kiss I felt myself push past the relationship danger I’ve been sensing that makes me want to at once dive in and make a relationship be real already and also makes my stomach turn as I search desperately for reasons any-he should never work. Thirty seems to make substance and connections appear in places we might not expect, and start to win out over pure unadulterated beauty.

As I watch the days go by and my leonine birthday speeds in my direction, I think of that sweet kiss, and the acknowledgement I made to accept forward and 30 and not look back. And I may ask myself: Will it ever be the same as it was?

Caitlin Shetterly can be reached at bramhallsquare@yahoo.com