Sailing to Byzantium

I am thirty-four years old, sitting in the Municipal House and Theatre in Prague, listening to a group of string players produce some of the classics. All is well, as I enjoy the experience and am obliged with nothing more than to relax and be on holiday. But there is a distracting noise on the periphery. Not the whispering old German lady, confused about the order of the programme, or the occasional cough from an audience member. It's something else, something more sinister. The sound, steady and continuous, grows louder as it dawns on me what it is — it's the sifting sound of sand passing through the waist of an hourglass.

Thirty-four is an apparently harmless and uninteresting age; it signifies nothing, offers no allusions or milestones. It does not bestow you the key to adulthood, nor put you at risk of joining the 27 Club. It is not the age of retirement or the age of Christ. It is just another event horizon, a point of no return. As I watch these older players perform, I cannot but think of the many years of practice it has taken them to get to this level, yet I could not name one of them. At my age, as young as it may seem, I am unlikely to ever be a musician of note. Another door has closed on life's corridor; it wasn't the first, and it won't be the last. At thirty-four, my dream of representing my country in football and winning the World Cup is a seven-goal thriller is also becoming highly implausible. When I consider how I haven't kicked a ball more than a handful of times since I was in my teens, it exhausts my supply of denial. However, the scarcity of TV channels in my childhood, lack of a love life in my adolescence, and rarity of honest days' work in my twenties have all left me with a formidable imagination.

It's all a matter of time really. I'll be kicking a ball around with my nephews, when a wise, old scout (with some sort of problem, in need of redemption and vindication) will notice my latent, natural gifts. The Luke Skywalker of soccer, having finally found his Yoda, will be trained within less than six months, and be playing Premier League football shortly thereafter. I'll bring Melchester Rovers back to glory, and take Ireland to the World Cup finals in Russia. The commentators will be all in agreement of my Galáctico status, surprised to find I am a day over twenty-five. "With his agility and energy reserves, he could have another ten years left in the tank." And what years they will be, full of trophies, WAGs, orange slices, and dramatic glory. A perfect cocktail of some of the shining lights from the pantheon of the greats: the mysterious longevity of Roger Milla, the wizardry of Zidane, the precision of Pirlo, the physicality of Bobby Moore, the brazen flair of Eric Cantona, and the astonishing flukiness of Luther Blisset.

The golden mane is the only fantastical part of this depiction.

"At your age, you should have long-since parted with such fantasies", I hear you say. I would heed your words, but I know well that mankind lives and dies by its ignis fatuus. Show me something that isn't the product of delusion, and I'll show you how blind you are. If you have accessed this article via Facebook or Twitter, you haven't got a leg to stand on. That said, I will admit certain dictums of the age. When you are thirty-four, things that used to come easy are now quite tiring, and I have difficulty reconciling all my unlikely goals into one vision. Will I ever see daylight shine on all of my dreams fulfilled? Can my aspirations to be the following all exist at once?

• a professional tennis player
• a master chess player
• a gymnast
• Calvin Klein underwear model
• an inspiring political figure
• a novelist
• an influential philosopher
• a popular blogger

I hear you mutter, "regular content, coherent theme" under your breath to that last one, but I'm done listening to you. Your criticisms only remind me of the mountain of exercise, practice, tenacity, writing, reading, network building, meetings, speeches, community work, downplaying of intellectual prowess, exaggeration of intellectual prowess, lip pursing while ruminating, chin stroking, and autograph signing I have to do. And that's before you consider that perpetual flow state I will have to obtain to achieve even half of these things. At overwhelming times like these, I remember half a lifetime ago, when I read, with some confusion, how W.B. Yeats wished to be an ancient Grecian mosaic. Now I understand. Make some space for me on the Byzantine wall, William, I'll give you some tips on how not to embarrass yourself in front of the ladies.

The despair and disillusionment passes. Thirty-four years has also made me wiser and more self-accepting. No person, after all, is complete without its subject's delusions and flights of fantasy, and the imagination can be a great ally. I can even project myself past death, though I will no longer be. I see myself, one day, dust in the wind, nourishment for the earth, recycled, dispersed, and melded with all class of things, alive and dead. Not quite myself, perhaps, but free from any delusions, I think.

Me and Yeats, where we should be. How Luther Blisset got there too is as mysterious as his transfer to AC Milan.