O. was the richest child at school, but he loved always to wear his oldest and most damaged clothes he had. In the first grade no one laughed at him, because O. was O.. What do children know about order anyway? Even once Mo came to O. and said: "O., I like your holes in your trousers, please, please make me one too, we are friends." Now Mo and O. both were walking around with a hole in their left trouser leg. Si and Mi, which were part of the group of friends, followed them, so that in the end half of the class had holes in their trousers. O. was very happy with his clothes and his mother and father could never convince him to wear better clothes, even if they didn't like what their son was wearing. As much as the holes in the trousers, O. loved the holes in autumn leaves or the holes of caterpillar bites in the summer. He would hold the leaves in front of his eyes and look through. Beside his damaged clothes and holes in leaves, he had a fondness for card games. Many of those cards had different monsters printed on, which, as he would know in later age, correspond to every god in every religion, but as a small child he never thought about that. A lot more he was interested in the pigeon beside the sandbox. He thought to understand it, even if they didn't talk the same language. When he tried to mimic its voice, the pigeon would shortly look at him and then go back to its doing again. From the second grade on, the children were talking of boys and girls and also about smoking and alcohol. For O. it was incomprehensible. He rather wanted to go back to the first graders, because he didn't understand the difference between boys and girls and nicotine and percentage. Rather it didn't matter for him. Also he still loved his old damaged clothes. Still he would try to talk to the animals, which meanwhile many children would think of was crazy. As for his friends Si, Mi and Mo, they still wore their perforated clothes and didn't think of him as crazy when he was speaking to the animals. Rather they tried to do it alike, but recognized, that they didn't have fun in doing so. Si was interested in drawing on the ground with stones, while Mo had a big card collection, with which he build a small stand and traded them with other children. Mi was drawing too, but her favourite occupation was to climb trees. So when all four were playing together, they would cheer Mi when she climbed on trees, gave advice to Si what and whom to draw, helped Mo to find new costumers to trade with and told O. in which bush an animal was hiding. In the third grade, for many children it was important to wear good clothes and look nice, to the chagrin of O. and his friends. With new clothes, also money got important, because good clothes needed money. Word got around that O.'s parents had a lot of money, which was incomprehensible for many, for O. still loved to wear his old clothes, which were at that time a bit tight, but still wearable. They thought O. was foolish. Fortunately no one laughed at him, but also no one took him serious. Si, Mi and Mo didn't wear their perforated clothes anymore, instead they wore new ones. Still they were close friends with O.. It was one night, a school festival was hold at school, all were in the auditorium to see a theatre piece of the third graders, as O., bored by so many people, sneaked out to the schoolyard. It was dark on the yard. O. looked around, but no one was around. He walked to the sandbox to look there. Also here no one was around. The sand was shining yellowish in the dark night. He looked further, as suddenly he caught the sight of a pigeon looking at him. He looked back. The pigeon continued to look at him, picked something and looked up again. O. pretended to pick something too, as the pigeon bursted out in laugh:"hahaha ha hahaha" O. looked at the pigeon in amazement. "Did you just laugh at me?" he said. "Yes, I did." said the pigeon. "How come you are able to speak and never spoke to me in all the years before? I know you. You are the pigeon, that is always here." "Yes, I am. Why should i speak to you? This was just so funny, that I lost my control and needed to laugh. That usually never happens to me." "Is it so funny when I pretend to be you? Maybe I am a pigeon too!" "No, you are not. And look at you! For years you are wearing the same dirty clothes. I have never changed my clothes, because I have my feathers, but still they are cleaner and without holes! Please wear something else!" "But I like these clothes very much. They are comfortable and the holes let me feel the fresh wind on my skin. This makes me feel much closer to the wind. Does any breeze come through your tight feathers?" "No it doesn't and that is a good thing, otherwise I would freeze all the time. Please go and wear something else tomorrow. And stop pretending to be me. You are not a pigeon. You don't know what it means to be a pigeon, human." O., shocked by the words of the pigeon, went head down back to the auditorium. The words of the pigeon hit his interest. The whole night he couldn't sleep, because all the time the words of the pigeon were circling in his mind. When morning came, he woke up totally exhausted. He put the clothes he usually wore in to a small chest under his bed. It hurt him to not wear his beautiful perforated clothes again, he took the words of the pigeon very seriously. He changed his clothes to new ones, but no one was surprised. Rather, everyone assumed that he came to his senses.
Young Man with a Broken Pen