"It’s one of the quietest and loneliest places in Rome. The city has grown up, around it over centuries, feels like a precious womb, like a heartache you won’t let go of… as it hurts too good. We all want things to stay the same, David. Settle for living in misery because we’re afraid of change, of things crumbling to ruins.

Then I looked around this place, at the chaos it’s endured, the way it’s been adapted, burnt, pillaged then found a way to build itself back up again and I was reassured. Maybe my life hasn’t been so chaotic, it’s just the world that is and the only real trap is getting attached to any of it.

Ruin is a gift. Ruin is the road to transformation.

Even in this eternal city, the Augusteum showed me that we must always be prepared for endless waves of transformation."