One must suffer to be educated...

They say that youth is lost on the young.
Not so...

I spent years in adolescence puzzling about how so many boring men had managed to live in Rome and why it was necessary to write down every blessed word they said.

Such endeavour was useful when I finally (since all roads lead, even after, many years, to Rome) managed to visit the eternal city and walk the same cobbles as these, now, seemingly erudite, gentlemen.