How many of you have ever heard a story that has a wizard in it?
How many of you have every seen a wizard in a movie or on TV?
Well, last year about this time my husband and I and a couple of our friends saw a wizard in person. Now, in all the stories you usually have to go a long, long way to see a wizard, and we did. We started here [show on globe] in Massachusetts and went all the way to New Zealand, to a city called Christchurch.
[Wizard (Dave Kay) enters from left door, away from children. He stands and watches from a distance.]
Now Christchurch is a city with a big church in it. And out in front of the church is a public square. Every afternoon at about one o'clock the Wizard comes out and starts to talk. He wears a really strange costume and--
Wizard: What are you doing?
Introducer: I have to introduce you. You need an introduction.
Wizard: I need nothing and you don't have to do any such thing. I want to talk and I'm going to. Now go sit down.
[Introducer sits down.]
Have you ever noticed how many things people "have to do"? Your parents have to do a lot of things, don 't they? Especially when there's something you'd like them to do. They have to go to work. They have to pay the bills. They have to clean the house. They have to go through the mail. They have to read the paper. They have to go to the store. They have to talk to people on the telephone. [stage whisper] Do you think they really have to do all those things?
But you do it too, don't you? You can't come to dinnner right now, you have to finish watching this television show. You have to finish the game you're playing. You have to do your homework. At Christmas you had to get that special toy everyone else was getting. You have to see this movie. You have to go to baseball practice. You have to wear what everyone else is wearing. You have to shave your head the way Tommy's older brother shaved his. There are a lot of things you have to do.
Well. I am a wizard. And do you know what that means? It means I don't have to do anything.
Was I always a wizard? Well, no. Once I was a child just like you. More intelligent and more handsome, of course, but a lot like you all the same. I remember quite clearly: I was sitting at the dinner table and my mother was telling me that I had to eat my green beans. And suddenly I had a revelation. I said, "Why do I have to eat my green beans?" which I had never asked before. My mother said "If you don't eat your green beans, you won't grow up big and strong like your father." I looked at my father, and then I said "I am prepared to take that risk." Much unpleasantness followed, but I did not eat my green beans.
Soon I began to ask why about a great many things. Why did I have to go to school? They told me, "If you don't go to school you won't get a job." But I said, "I don't want a job." Think about it: Did Jesus have a job? Socrates? Jeremiah? In the entire history of the world has any really interesting person had a job? I think not.
"But you have to get a job," they told me. "Why?" I asked.
"Because you have to have money," they said. And I said, "Why?"
"Because you have to have a car. You have to have a house. You have to raise children. You have to have a television, designer jeans, Nintendo, furniture, carpeting, washing machines, microwaves, computers, Air Jordans, MTV, Big Macs, Coca-Colas." And I said "No." Because that is the special perogative of a wizard. A wizard can always say "No." And since that time I have not done any of those things that people said I had to do unless it pleased me to do so. And I do not have any of those things that people said I had to have.
Now you probably like a lot of those things, and so you will probably never want to be a wizard. There are very few of us. But just in case you ever do, you will have to remember the secret. No one can become a wizard unless they know the secret. It's a secret that your parents will never tell you. Your teachers will never tell you. You will never hear it on television or read it in a newspaper. No one but a wizard will ever tell you this secret. And so you'd better listen closely, because unless you meet another wizard you will never hear this secret again: Nobody has to have anything. Nobody has to do anything.
You'll go back to your seats and your parents will say "Oh that crazy wizard, you can't listen to him." But you and me, we know the secret.
Now go. [Waves his hand, turns and leaves.]