For in hope's absence, a miracle arrived

I have not led an ordinary life, nor a life that would suit everyone. I took great risks, but because I did, I also earned great reward. I found the way to show my true face freely, without fear. Because of this, I found true love.

All of us show many faces to the world. No one shows her true face all of the time. To do that would be dangerous, for what is seen can also be known.

That is what love is I thought. A possibility that becomes a choice. A choice you keep making over and over. Day after day. Year after year. Time after time.

Thinking about dark and troublesome things, wondering when they'll come to pay you a visit, turns out to be the very best way to call them to your side.

Over and over, we start our own tales, compose our own stories, whether our lives are short or long. Until at last all our beginnings come down to just one end, and the tale of who we are is done.

For surely a king is first a man. And so it must follow that a king does as all men do: the best he can.