The Thousands

I am writing this copy when I am 33, but by the time anyone reads it I will be 34. Bummer. To steady myself through the journey into ‘mid thirties’ I have selected some powerful tools: a 12-year-old whiskey, an open fire and Fantastic Man magazine No. 11.

I approach Fantastic Man like Maverick in Top Gun: first a flyby and then, later on, comes the more serious engagement. I usually gloss over the fashion. It is impeccable, humorous and elegant – but totally beyond my life, and just a dream that I’m not sure I ever want to live. I delight in the MATTERS ON WORDS section; laugh at the OPEN LETTER TO DONALD TRUMP and wonder how they work an article called THE EGG MCMUFFIN CONTROVERSY into a style journal.

But I submerge myself in feature interviews. That’s where the gold is. Not just for a man about to have a birthday, but for any man who has wondered what being a man might be about. Here, the revered photographer Wolfgang Tillmans (aged 41) admits that he "fears nothing more than losing a sense of uncertainty and doubt about himself", his admonition becoming another tool that I take into my mid thirties.