25 years OLD today

I had planned a fantastic post today about immortality (as one does…) but as I sat down to type it out, my mother called up the stairs:

‘Don’t forget, it’s your birthday tomorrow!’

Thanks for reminding me, mum.

’25! That’s a quarter of a century! A third of your life, GONE!’

You can shut up now, mum.

‘By the time I was your age, I was married and had you!’

I shut my door, sat down and… pouted. How am I meant to think philosophically about immortality — the soul, your mind, infinity — when my mother’s busy reminding me of my own, pesky mortality?

‘I expect grandchildren sooner rather than later, Sebby.’ Somehow, her nagging had penetrated my door. Remind me to buy some high-density foam with my birthday money. To soundproof my room. Though, I could probably smother her with it, too; and no, not in ‘smothered in cream’ sense — I’m not Oedipus.

And so it is with anger in my fingers that I bash out this blog entry. I’m not old damnit. I have plenty of time to get things done, to find the next love of my life and to spawn a son suitable for inheriting my universal empire. Oodles of hours and a slew of centuries — however you measure it, it’s still time, a slave destined to bend to the wishes of its master: us. Mark my words, friends: we will live forever.

Laying aside that particular topic, I have a bunch of fun photos to share with you, to celebrate the first 25 years of my life. But first, as with all living things, there was a birth. I was born after 48 hours of labour, by Caesarean section (fitting, considering my aspirations), to a rather tired mother. I was almost called Dominic (of all names, why Dominic?) but thankfully my mother’s crush for Sebastian Flyte in Brideshead Revisited prevailed. I can’t imagine being called Dominic now; it’s hardly the name of an intergalactic imperator.

That’s me, a month or two old — it’s hard to tell, because I was a huge baby, 10lbs or more (remember, ladies, 48 hours. 2 days of labour). The Brits will recognise the gesture I’m making; the rest of you will just have to believe me when I say it’s a fitting flick of the fingers. Looking through our Hall of Fame (we have a corridor dedicated to our old photos), I hardly recognise myself until I’m about 2 or 3. New-born, I look like my mother — a year or two later, I start to look like my father. By the age of 4, I’m a bit of both but a new ingredient has been thrown into the mix: cuteness.

It’s kind of sad to realise, looking through the hall of fame, that I’ll never be as cute as that again. I peaked at the age of four. Perhaps my mother is right — perhaps I do need to find a wife as soon as possible. Perhaps, as each day ticks by and another year is sliced from my mortality, I’m getting uglier. Ugh. Oh well. I’ll just tell every girl that I meet that I actually look just like the photo above, if I shave it all off. That’ll work.

Things got a little wonky after that, and I shan’t be posting pictures from my teenage years again. If you really want to see what I look like, go and read my childhood entries. Warning: I look a bit like a girl.

Moving swiftly on, from the androgynous Beatles-lookalike stage of my life, I bring you kicking-and-screaming to my 21st birthday!

I’m having more fun than it looks, I promise. I’m just making it quite clear that the bits of foil stuck on my face were not my own doing, and they kept falling off into my food. Japanese food deserves better than that, damnit! Fun side-story: the phone being looked at in the background has naked photos of my ex-girlfriends on, and they’re just about to find them. And one of them was my girlfriend at the time (hah, that’ll teach them to pry!) It’s also the phone I eventually lost on a bus, making some guy (or girl) very lucky indeed… sorry, girlfriends. I’m sure they can’t identify you from that angle, anyway.

I’ll finish with a photo from my last summer ball — the final event in the university’s social calendar — with what seems to be a very happy girl in my arms:

It’s shocking how much I look like my cousin, but that’s another story for another day! By the time you read this, I’m probably in bed, trying to catch a few fleeting hours of sleep before my mother bounds into my bedroom to celebrate the passing of yet another significant milestone in my life. Twenty-one, check. Quarter-century, check. The next must surely be ‘get married’… Or will thirty come and go…?

It’s not too late to send me a birthday present! I accept almost any form of gift/keepsake including, but not limited to: book token, personalised poem, (un)used underwear, cash or banker’s draft.