Happy Birthday to Me.

This Summer saw the passing of my 34th birthday and I have to confess I felt a little funny about it.

In a self-reflective mood, I asked myself the typical questions that one does at such moments: was I getting too old? ; had life been passing me by a bit? ; and what had I achieved to date?

It was while posing such questions that I was reminded of the reported words of my great, great ... [etc] uncle Caesar, of whom it was said that:

"... when he was in Spain and had some leisure he was reading some part of the history of Alexander and, after sitting for a long time lost in his own thoughts, burst into tears. His friends were surprised and asked him the reason. 'Don't you think', he said, 'that I have something worth being sorry about,when I reflect that at my age Alexander was already king over so many peoples, while I have never yet achieved anything really remarkable?'

Alexander died at the startlingly young age of 33, having conquered much of the known world. Julius Caesar however, did not even embark upon the great period of his career until he was well into his 40's and indeed did not reach the pinnacle of that career until into his 60's!

Its classical musings such as these that re-assure a young emperor and remind me that there is no fixed age at which one can flourish.