In this world, things always go up and down. Either you go up, or you fall down. Most people experience these changes throughout their lives. In the end, we all become tower keepers, standing high up and watching everything that happens in the world.
This is something my friend Ole once said. He was an old tower keeper I knew, with an interesting personality and a knack for saying amusing things. He seemed to say whatever came to mind, but he actually had a lot on his mind. He came from a good family and was said to be the son of a high-ranking official—though that might not have been entirely true. He had read books, worked as a teacher’s assistant, and even served as a pastor’s assistant. But later, he had a falling out with the pastor and left.
Why did they argue? It was because of shoe polish. Olie thought that shoes should be polished with real leather polish, but the priest only allowed him to use ordinary oil. They each stuck to their own opinion, one saying the other was too stingy, the other saying the other was too particular. In the end, they parted ways over this trivial matter.
In fact, it wasn’t just the priest; he had similar expectations of the world as a whole. He wanted the best things in life, but reality always gave him mediocrity.Gradually, he became less and less interested in interacting with people and wanted to be alone.
In a big city, the quietest place to live is probably the tower of a church. So he moved into the tower, where he walked around alone, smoking his pipe and watching the people below. He often thought about things and said things that others couldn’t see or think of.
I liked to lend him books to read. I believe that the books a person likes to read reveal what kind of person they are. He said he didn’t like novels for nannies, nor did he like French stories that were romantic and sentimental. He said they were all old clichés about wind and flowers. He preferred real stories, such as biographies or books about natural wonders.
I visited him once a year, usually just after the New Year. Every time I went, he would talk to me about things he had thought about during the transition from the old year to the new. I wanted to record my two meetings with him, using his own words as much as possible.
My first visit to Oleg
Recently, I borrowed a book about stones for him. He found it particularly interesting and read it for quite a while.
“Do you know?”he said, “These stones are actually treasures left behind by ancient people! Many people walk past them without ever noticing them. When I walk along the beach or in the fields, I see stones like these everywhere on the ground. People walk on the streets, stepping on the stones that pave the way, but no one thinks that these stones might have been left behind millions of years ago. I didn’t pay much attention to them before, but now I feel a deep respect for every single stone.”
“Thank you for lending me this book. It has shown me many new things and changed my previous views. It even makes me want to read more books like this.”
“The story of the Earth is the most interesting. Unfortunately, we couldn’t understand the first volume because it was written in a language we don’t understand. We can only slowly understand it through the strata, stones, and changes in the Earth. In the sixth volume, humans appear, and that is the story of Adam and Eve.Some people think they appear too late because they want to see the story of humans sooner. But that doesn’t matter to me. The story of the Earth is really fascinating, and we all live in this legend.“
”We crawl around on Earth, but I myself remain in the same place. The Earth keeps turning, preventing the water in the oceans from pouring down on us. The ground doesn’t crack open and drop us into the center of the Earth. This story has been told for millions of years.”
“Thank you for this book. These stones are really interesting. If they could talk, they’d have so many stories to tell us. Sometimes I think it’s not so bad to be a small, insignificant person, especially someone like me who sits up high. We humans, even with our fancy clothes, titles, and medals, are just tiny insects on Earth. Compared to these stones that are millions of years old, we’re so young it’s almost funny.”
“I was so engrossed in reading this book the other day that I forgot to do what I usually love to do on New Year’s Eve—watch ‘The Crazy Trip to Jamaica.’”
“You’ve probably heard the story of witches riding broomsticks to travel, right? That’s a traditional activity in Europe on St. Hans’ Night, with the destination being Brokeback Mountain. But we have a similar journey, too—on New Year’s Eve, everyone goes to Jamaica together.”
“All those lesser-known poets, writers, musicians, and artists in the art scene take off on New Year’s Eve. Some ride paintbrushes, some ride quill pens—but not fountain pens, they’re too hard. I watch them every year and recognize quite a few. But there’s no point in interacting with them, because they don’t want anyone to know they’re sneaking off to Jamaica.”
“I have a niece who’s a fisherwoman. She says she provides insults for a few newspapers. She’s even been to the newspaper office—they had to carry her in because she doesn’t have a quill pen and can’t ride. She told me all this herself. Half of what she says is probably made up, but that’s more than enough.”
“Once she got there, everyone started singing. Everyone wrote their own songs and sang them. Everyone thought theirs was the best, but they were all pretty much the same. Then there were the talkative ones, with all sorts of voices going at once. Next came the drummers, who had been practicing at home. Some people took the opportunity to make friends; they wrote articles without signing their names, just like using regular oil instead of shoe polish.”
“There was also an executioner and his assistant, who was the smartest one, otherwise no one would have noticed him. The kind-hearted garbage collector also came, rummaging through trash bins while shouting, ‘Good, very good, excellent!’Just as everyone was having a good time, suddenly a stick emerged from a pile of trash, grew into a tree, bloomed into a huge flower, and the roof popped up, turning into a pole on which this group of VIPs were carried, showcasing everything they had done in the past year. Sparks flew like fireworks, representing the ideas and opinions they had plagiarized, now transformed into sparks.”
“Next, everyone played the ‘burning incense’ game, while the young poets played ‘burning the heart.’ Some humorists told puns, which were the simplest games. Their jokes echoed like empty cans banging against doors or pots filled with charcoal being struck. ‘This is so much fun!’ my niece said.She also said a lot of sharp-tongued remarks, but they were indeed quite amusing. But I won’t repeat those words here, after all, one should be kind and not always point out others’ flaws.”
“You can imagine that someone like me, who knows the joyful scenes there, naturally enjoys watching these madmen fly by every New Year’s Eve. If someone doesn’t come one year, I’ll find a new face to replace them. But this year I didn’t go to see them. I was carried away by the stones, traveling through millions of years of time. I saw these stones floating freely in the northern lands, long before Noah built the ark.I saw them sink to the ocean floor and emerge from sandbanks. The sandbanks rose above the water and said, ‘This is Serran Island!’ I saw it first as a haven for birds, then as the dwelling place of wild chieftains. I didn’t know these wild people, but they carved the name ‘Runi’ into the stones with axes, and that became history. Yet I had no part in any of this; I was merely an observer.”
“Three or four shooting stars streaked across the sky, illuminating my thoughts. Do you know what shooting stars are? Even some learned people may not understand. I have my own view on them. I believe that when we do good deeds, others may not express their gratitude, but they feel it in their hearts. This gratitude, though silent, has meaning. I believe the sunlight absorbs this gratitude and quietly delivers it back to those who did the good deeds.If an entire nation expresses this gratitude for a long time, then this gratitude will become a bouquet of flowers, a shooting star, and fall on the grave of that good person.“
”Whenever I see a shooting star, especially on New Year’s Eve, I feel especially happy, knowing who has received this gratitude. Recently, a bright star fell in the southwest, probably to thank many people.I think it will land on a rocky cliff in the Flensburg Fjord, where the Danish flag flies, and the graves of Schiller, Rasmus, and other warriors are there. Another meteor fell on land, landing on ‘Sulo’—a tribute to Holberg, thanking him for writing so many wonderful plays.”
“There is no greater joy than knowing that a shooting star has fallen on your grave. Of course, no shooting star will fall on my head, nor will the sun bring gratitude, because I have nothing to be thankful for. I didn’t get that real shoe polish.” Ole laughed, “I am destined to only get ordinary grease in this world.”
Second Visit to Ole
It was a new year, and I climbed the tower again to find him. This time, he talked about the story of the wine glasses.
“On New Year’s Eve, when the clock strikes twelve, everyone raises their glasses to toast the new year. They hold their wine glasses to welcome the new year, which is a good start for those who love to drink. They spend the first day of the new year sleeping, which is also a good start for those who love to sleep.”
“Do you know what’s in the cups?” he asked. “They contain health, happiness, and revelry, as well as sorrow and pain. When I count these cups, I’m also counting the weight of what each person drinks in a year.”
“The first cup is the cup of health! It has healthy grass growing in it. You put it on the roof beam, and by the end of the year, you can sit under a healthy tree and enjoy the shade.”
“Pick up the second cup! A little bird flies out of it. It sings a joyful song, encouraging everyone to sing along: ‘Life is beautiful! Don’t look down; be brave and move forward!’”
“A little elf jumps out of the third cup. He is not entirely an angel because he is a little mischievous. He won’t hurt anyone, he just likes to joke around. He hides behind your ear and tells you funny stories. He crawls into your heart and makes you cheerful and your mind sharper.”
“The fourth cup contains only the limits of reason—a person can never cross this line.”
“When you pick up the fifth cup, you will cry. You will feel a strong emotional urge, and if you don’t cry, it will manifest in other ways. The Prince of Revelry will appear, take you away, and make you forget your identity. You will forget many things you shouldn’t forget. There will be parties, singing, and chaos everywhere. Masks will take you away. Devilish daughters dressed in silk, with their hair flowing and legs exposed, will laugh as they approach.If you can avoid them, try your best to do so.“
”Satan himself sits in the sixth cup. He is a well-dressed, gentle, and very likable person. He understands you completely and supports everything you say. He is just like another you! He comes with a lamp to take you home. Once upon a time, there was a saint who was asked to choose one of the seven deadly sins. He chose the one he thought was the least serious—drunkenness.But drunkenness led to the other six sins. The blood of humans and demons mixed in the sixth cup. At that moment, the evil thoughts within us began to grow, like the mustard seed in the Bible, growing into a great tree that covered the entire world. Most people have only one way out: to return to the furnace and be reforged.”
“That is the story of the cup!” said the tower keeper Oleg. “It can be told with the finest shoe polish or with ordinary oil. I have used both.”
This was the conversation between Oleg and me during our second meeting. If you want to hear more of his stories, you’ll have to keep coming back.
