Halfway to 70
Halfway to 70 Today is my 35 th birthday. I didn’t have any sense until I drank myself sober on my 20 th birthday. As I threw up in a nightclub toilet, I experienced a moment of crystal like clarity. I realised that the best I could hope for would be to live to 100 years old and that at 20 one fifth of my life was already over. Furthermore, I realised that by 25 that figure would leap from a fifth to a quarter and by the time I’m 30 almost one third of my life would be gone. I didn’t like who I was or where my life was heading, so decided to walk out of that nightclub and never look back. That choice stemming from that single moment of poignant self-reflection is what led to me putting down roots of my own. It’s been 15 years since that night, so now seems like an appropriate time for further reflection. This year I had my 1 st article commissioned by a prominent publication. The kind of platform that can easily launch a career. However, things became complicated when I was