"Settling down"

I've been thinking about this a lot since I saw this thread, and honestly, I'm still not sure how I want to answer this.

When I was younger (high school age), my best friend and I discussed marriage by age 24. Just a week ago, we discussed this again, thinking about where we are in life (her with a boyfriend of 2+ years that she's not entirely happy with, me without any prospects in sight)... and realized that 24 is suddenly a LOT closer than we'd expected.

I know that marriage is something that I want in the future. Much of it probably has to do with the security associated with it, but with divorce rates as they are, that comfort is slowly disappearing. The idea of being handed divorce papers is terrifying to me.

My cousin was recently married and had a kid, all around age 30. While logic (and my mother) tells me that that's a wonderful age to aim for marriage - plenty of time to work on my career and settle into my own life - another part of me panics, thinking that it could very well be 'too late' by that point. I'd like to be 'settled down' before then, and certainly no kids before marriage (if at all).

So all in all, it comes down to me 'playing it by ear'. Ideally, I like to think that I'll 'just know' when I'm ready for something like that.

Jam it back in, in the dark.