Once a friend of mine decided to bore a hole in the sea.
He saw it like this: you start on your way, reach the sea, bore the hole you need, and then go back. Quite a simple and easy affair.
For that friend of mine most things in the world were simple and clear. To begin with, some were not, but as soon as he looked at them with his kind and clever eyes, things would obligingly and even gladly, become simple and clear.
But when my friend decided to bore a hole in the sea, there were people who said that he was mad. To go and bore a hole in the sea was madness.
‘Why?’ my friend asked. ‘Have you ever bored one?’
It turned out they had not.
‘Then how do you know it’s madness?’
Well, everybody said it was.
‘But have they bored one?’ he asked.
‘Who?’
‘Everybody?’
It turned out that they had not bored one either.
‘Have they tried to, at least?’
It turned out that they had not tried to, either.
Then my friend begged their pardon, but asked why on earth he should be considered mad, and they should not be considered so. And in general, why did they always go and prevent people from doing the work they intended to do by various statements and maxims. He said he had made up his mind to bore a hole in the sea and he would do it. He had not much time to lose either – he needed the hole at once.
He said good-bye to the people who told him he was mad, took his tools and started on his way to the sea.
Before setting out for the sea, he said good-bye to his wife, too. She used to say that other people contrived their lives much better and were now touring up and down Bulgaria in their cars, enjoying the weather, while he was going to bore holes in the sea. She said he was always getting ideas into his head, and would not let well alone until he had tried them out.
My friend looked at her with those kind and clever eyes of his, but she did riot become simple and clear, as most things did, but stuck to her guns. Then he said ‘Good-bye’ to her and got on the train. On the train, everybody began to engage in general conversation as is usually the case in trains: first they talked about the weather, then expressed their opinion about the football matches, and after that they discussed foreign policy and the latest cunning manoeuvres of world imperialism. Finally each one started explaining the reason for his train journey. It turned out that they were all travelling on business.
‘What is your business?’ they asked my friend.
‘I am going to bore a hole in the sea,’ he answered.
‘So you are not going on business,’ the other passengers laughed, ‘just on visit to the sea, eh?’
‘Why not?’ my friend said. ‘I told you I’m going to bore a hole in the sea.’
‘Do you mean that seriously?’ the people asked.
‘How else should I mean it?’ my friend said. ‘Of course, I mean it seriously. I’ve got my tools here.’
‘And you are going to bore a hole in the sea?!?!’
‘Yes, I’ve decided to!’ my friend replied. ‘I’m going to get through with the job before it’s too late. I need the hole now; got to do it at once.’
‘You need the hole now, do you?’ the people asked.
‘That’s right!’ my friend said. ‘I just happen to need it.’
The people in the compartment looked at each other and winked.
‘Are you going to make a big one?’ they asked.
‘I’ll make it the size I need it,’ he said. ‘I know what size I need.’
Then the people started looking carefully at my friend from top to toe, and then, one by one, they went out of the compartment to have a smoke in the corridor of the train.
A little later three men came into the compartment, with the guard at their head. What immediately struck my friend was the build of their bodies. They were obviously in the best of health, and you could almost see them bursting with muscle and strength.
‘In the past they chose people like you for the Guards,’ he told them.
They agreed with him immediately and asked him if he had served in the Guards.
‘I was too young,’ he said. ‘I was at school at that time.’
Again they agreed with him immediately and asked him if the seats were free.
‘There were some people in here,’ he said. ‘I’ve no idea whether they’ve got off the train or whether they’ll be coming back to their seats. They went outside to have a smoke.’
The men said that those passengers had got off at the previous stop, but my friend thought this rather strange, as their luggage was still in the rack.
‘In that case they must have forgotten their luggage,’ my friend observed. ‘They must be extraordinarily absent-minded fellows.’
The men asked him if they could remain in the compartment. ‘Please do,’ my friend said ‘and let’s hope it’s for the best.’ The three men turned slightly pale and asked him what he meant.
‘I was joking,’ he said. ‘People used to say that in the past, when they were superstitious.’
The three men became visibly calmer and asked him on what business he was travelling, if it was not a secret.
‘I’m going to bore a hole in the sea.’ my friend said.
‘In the sea?’ the men asked.
‘That’s right,’ my friend said. ‘I just happen to need it.’
‘And have you got your tools with you?’ they asked again.
‘They are over there in the corner,’ my friend said pointing to them.
‘They’re fine tools!’ the men said. ‘And how long do you think it is going to take you to do the job?’
‘Well, I’ll try and get through with it quickly,’ my friend replied. ‘I need the hole at once.’
Then one of the men looked at his watch and said in an unnatural voice: ‘It’s four o’clock!’ In spite of the fact that it was already eight o’clock. At the same moment all three of them set on my friend, twisted his arms behind his back, tied him up and told him to accompany them to the guard’s van.
At the next station they took him off the train and sent him back to Sofia for a medical check.
There the whole story was repeated all over again.
‘You mean a hole in the sea?’ the doctor asked.
‘In the sea!’ my friend replied calmly, looking at the doctor with his kind eyes and wondering why everybody who heard that was so astonished.
‘A hole?’ the doctor asked.
‘That’s right, a hole,’ my friend answered.
They asked him who he was and whether he was not by any chance John Barleycorn, Nebuchadnezzar, Cleopatra or Rameses II, the Egyptian Pharaoh.
‘Are you crazy?’ my friend said. ‘What Pharaoh are you talking about? Can’t you see the name in my passport?’
Then the psychiatry people got huffed and said it was not they who were crazy but he.
‘Why crazy?’ my friend asked. ‘Because I want to bore a hole in the sea? Haven’t you ever wanted to do that?’
‘No!’ the people answered.
‘Why should I be mad for wanting to do it and you for not wanting to do it?’
‘Because it’s madness to bore a hole in the sea. It is impossible!’
My friend asked them if they had ever tried to make a hole in the sea, or to do something which was known to be mad and impossible. They answered that they had not and that though they were working in an asylum they were not mad.
‘But have you never, never tried to do anything that is thought to be mad?’ he asked them.
‘Never, never’, they answered.
My friend was sorry for them and they were sorry for him; he thought that they were very, very unhappy and they thought he was very, very unhappy: he tried to relieve their unhappiness and they tried to relieve his unhappiness.
Finally my friend took his tools, said good-bye to the people, and went on his way. I remember that he came straight to me and told me the whole story.
So these people would not let my friend bore a hole in the sea. And those who would not let him do it were the people who never wanted to do anything which was known to be impossible and crazy.
Still my friend bored that hole. He took his tools, went there and bored it. I was the only person he told about it, for he already knew what people were. But he told me, because he and I knew each other very well.
Now the sea has got a hole in it, it’s there, but those who say that they are going to drive holes into the sea are still declared mad by the majority of mankind.
Mankind can go on doing this, but I personally believe that it will be the mad ones that will first set foot on the other planets. They will walk about on the surface and craters, they will look straight into the sun and talk to the local inhabitants, who will be strange and, perhaps, also mad. Then they will take up their tools and go to drive holes into the seas of other galaxies.