I wake up (late), thanks to an annoying beep from my spiPhone, indicating an urgent message.
I don't want to wake up. I don't want to think about yesterday. Everything turned into a disaster, thanks to my capacity of not following orders. I don't want to read any message either. It's definitely from #1, The Boss, and it's extremely short.
Like: «you're fired».
Duh.
Whatever…
Urgent messages make your spiPhone beeping louder and louder, until you pick it up and read what's so urgent. Mother Nature's call is also an urgent message, so I visit the bathroom first.
Being fired is not really a problem; I'm young, I'm fit, I speak seven languages, and I can always go home and work the rest of my life in my parents' shop, selling Blutwurst from Diekirch on the street market. Billions of people do honest work like that, and most of them are leading happy and fulfilling lives. I've had my adventures, more than enough to tell my grandchildren fascinating stories. Grandchildren… If that's my next project to work on, I have to start thinking about children, perhaps about a wife. Pfff. If it's true what they say, then marriage is a more complicated mission than saving the world. I better start with reading the message; the beeps are now loud enough to wake up the guests in the hotel next door.
The message doesn't come from #1, The Boss, but from #2, The Nerd. It doesn't say I'm fired either. It's an invitation (and an urgent one, I have to be there in 15 minutes) to meet a certain Mister P.H. Johnsson and his daughter, to escort them for the complete day on their trip to Gibraltar. They want to see the monkeys and they want me as their bodyguard. The Nerd has added a personal note too: «Keeping the monkey of other people's backs… Just the job you've always dreamed of.»
This is… a surprise. I never expected to see Chelsea again, but fate had other plans.
* * *
"This was an excellent plan, dear. I enjoy it. We can even see Africa from here."
Mister Johnsson is in a pleasant mood, and so is his daughter: "I knew you would like this, Dad. On your vacation, you should do nice things, things you can't do at home. After lunch, if you like, we can spend the afternoon at sea. Arse… I mean, Mister Arsenal, knows someone who takes people on his boat to places where you can see dolphins. I mean REAL dolphins, not those football players from Miami in their Hard Rock Stadium."
Mister Johnsson admires his daughter's initiative: "That's a wonderful idea, dear. I would very much like to see those dolphins. Do you also know a place where we can have lunch?"
Chelsea runs ahead to see the monkeys and shouts over her shoulder: "Ask Arse. He knows a lot."
Mister Johnsson smiles when he sees how his daughter and the monkeys make faces at each other. He says to me: "She enjoys this excursion, don't you think?"
"She does, Sir, and I hope you like it too. For your daughter and me, this is an excursion, a day out to enjoy ourselves, but for a man like you, Sir, there's never a moment you're not working. I look at this rock and I see monkeys, animals, playing and enjoying themselves, but you look at this same rock with the eyes of a world leader. Here, you see this rock, and over there, you see a hard place, the human world. You see a metaphor.
» You look at the monkeys with a superior smile: they are all trying so hard to reach their highest goal, the top of the rock of Gibraltar. They have seven tools, the Seven Holy Virtues that every animal gets from Mother Nature to follow the Law of the Jungle, the Survival of the Fittest: Gluttony, Greed, Lust, Pride, Sloth, Wrath and Envy. On top of the rock, there can only be one, the Best, the Leader, the Number One. All the others suffer and sacrifice themselves, so their leader gets the best chance to survive. Here, on the Rock of Gibraltar, rules the Law of the Jungle: all the monkeys fight, fuck, and feed themselves. The most selfish animal is the Best, the winner, the proudest, allowed to sit on the top of the Rock.
» All this talk of freedom and human rights… This is what freedom leads to, the Holy Freedom that your country and your party are defending so much. The surrounding wall doesn't keep the illegal aliens out; it keeps the monkeys inside, so they can celebrate their fake freedom inside their prison every day. Only a stupid monkey wants to live like that."
Mr Johnsson is an honest man. He is motivated to do the right thing. But he's also a politician, who's told what to do by the majority in his country. If he wants that majority to change, he'll need the right words to explain to the world what went wrong. A story of fiction might help the voters in his country find a better truth. They'll need the Gibraltar metaphor. Mr Johnsson is listening.
"We, humans, are no monkeys. Our values are higher than just sex and food and rock 'n' roll. Even the strongest leader of the Clan of the Cave Bear was not strong enough to kill the mammoth, whose flesh could help him through winter and Ice Age, but humanity survived, thanks to our intelligence. If we had followed the Law of the Jungle, we would be extinct, like 99,99% of every animal species before us. Animals are stupid and selfish. We, humans, are social and intelligent. By working together, we killed the mammoth and invented the Internet. For the monkey, the highest possible was the top of this rock of Gibraltar, but we, humans, went to the moon and came back again. For us, the Jungle-virtues of Gluttony, Greed, Lust, Pride, Sloth, Wrath and Envy became sins, Seven Deadly Sins, elements of character that we learn to overcome. Selfishness holds humanity back in its progress to a better world for everyone. We developed Human Qualities, which helped us to live together as a species of social and intelligent individuals, qualities like patience, peacefulness and trust, tolerance and moderation, wisdom, respect, and love.
» You, as a leader, know how hard it is to make others realise that their selfishness, their greed, their lust for power, and their envy are evil relics of a long-forgotten past, instincts from the time when we were monkeys. You know these others need leaders, teachers, mature and wise mentors, who can explain why it's better to live in peace than to drop bombs on each other's heads. That's why people like me vote for people like you, Sir, because we admire what you stand for, and we want to follow the example you give us.
» For your daughter and me, this is a holiday that we will remember for the rest of our lives. For you, the choice between this rock and the hard place on the other side of that wall, this rock full of selfish stupid monkeys and that world of social and intelligent humans, is a metaphor to convince everyone who tries to push us back to the cavemen we were. For you, Sir, this is work."
Mister P.H. Johnsson is an intelligent man. He understands the tool I try to give him, words, to motivate others. Of course, there are always arguments that refer directly to our instincts: eat more, until you explode; be more selfish, only the fittest will survive; be lazy and bore yourself to death; fight as much as you can because only the most aggressive dinosaur can rule this planet. You can convince people by talking to their animal instincts. It requires intelligence to understand that peace is a better solution than war. Working together on a solution for everyone is better than following the orders of an aggressive dictator. It's hard work to learn how we can dominate our animal instincts, the core of all evil in our human society. It's hard work to be human. Peace is hard work, as said by President Barack Obama.
Mister Johnsson takes his time to think about my Gibraltar metaphor. I was right about one thing: if you're a leader, there's no such thing as a day off; everyone tries to influence you, everyone wants something from you.
"Dad, can I have ice cream? I mean… I have money and I like to buy you and Arse ice cream, if you want."
Well, almost everyone wants something from you. Sometimes, someone likes to give you something back for everything you did. Those are the ones who really love you, and perhaps the only ones who really are important to important people like Mister Johnsson.
"I would love ice cream, dear. Do they have chocolate flavor?"
"I'll have a look. And you, Arse? Do you want chocolate too?"
"I would like you to choose for me. I'm sure you will choose what's best.", I say, diplomatically.
When Chelsea runs off to the stand, Mister Johnsson smiles at me and says: "You are a remarkable man, Mister Arsenal. I don't know what you did yesterday, but my daughter is a different person today."
"Your daughter is still the same person, Sir. The only difference might be that she found out what a wonderful father she has."
Mister Johnsson smiles: "Thank you for the compliment, but that was not the difference I referred to. She… This morning, she got up early. She went to the beach and had a swim. She didn't even complain about the cold water. Then we had breakfast together, and we had a conversation which we'd never had before. She asked me about my work, she was interested in what I do, and she asked me if there wasn't anything that we, me and her, could do to make the world a better place, just a little bit better, for the poor peasant people who are caught in a crossfire with nothing to lose but their dirty shirts. She was worried about the people who suffer from the war in the Middle East. I heard exactly the same message yesterday, from a Luxembourg Diplomat. It made me think.
» She told me that she, too, had been thinking. She told me that one day she would like to marry and have children of her own, make me a granddad, and she wanted to help me make this world a better place for her children to grow up in. I told her I would love to be a granddad, and I would love to make this world a better place too. She asked me what she could do to help me. I told her about my meeting with The Diplomat, who asked the same thing. I told her I changed my mind, that I'm no longer convinced that bombs are a solution. We might try words. I will do my best to persuade my colleagues. We, the leaders of the world, work for all the people, not only for the taxpayers but also for the poor, not only for the people in our own country but also for the ones who live in other countries and on other continents."
"That is a wonderful idea, Sir. I always respected you because of the work you do, but I see now that you are also a good man, and a good father, which is perhaps even more important."
"I always tried to be a good father, but there's never enough time to do everything right. I've failed as a husband, and when I saw how my daughter behaved, I also doubted my qualities as a father. Until this morning. My daughter was… different. She never thought about the future, about responsibility, about children. She never thought about others. I wonder what happened yesterday. It looks like magic."
"Magic doesn't exist, Sir. The miracle is called «growing up». It happens to all of us."