By Paulo Coelho
Monty is never predictable. But he has the best quality someone can have: he is a good friend.
And he has also a gigantic default: his phone rings in the middle of any conversation,
regardless of how important the meeting is.
And in 90% of the cases, he answers the phone.
But l met quite a few visionaries in my life, and Monty is one of them. Always with new
projects that he manage to implement, always thinking ahead of most of the people.
But he is always a surprise. He might dance down the street, gaze into the eyes of a complete
stranger and speak of love, or else defend an apparently absurd idea (which by the way is
never absurd).
When he feels that the moment has arrived, he drops everything and goes off on some long-
dreamed-of adventure.
He never spends his days trying to play the role that others have chosen for him.
There is an oltl Arab story that goes like this:
Once upon a time there was a poor hut very brave man called Ali. He worked for Ammar, a rich
old merchant.
One winter’s night Ammar said: “No one can spend a night like this on the top of the mountain
without a blanketorƒoad. But you need money, and lƒ you can munage to do that you will receive
a great reward. lƒ you dont, you will workƒor thirty days without pay”.
Ali answered: “Tomorrow l shall do this test”.
But when he left the shop, he saw that a really icy wind was blowing and became scared, so he
decided to ask his bestfriend, Aydi, U’ lt was crazy of him to accept that het.
Ajter reƒlecting a while, Aydi answered: “l shall help you. Tomorrow, when you are at the top of
the mountain, look ahead. l will be on the top of the mountain next to yours, where l will spend
the whole night with a bonƒire lit ƒor you. You look at the fire and think about our jriendship-that
will keep you warm. You will manage, and later on l shall ask you something in return.”
Ali won the test _got the money, and went to his ƒriend’s house: “You told me you wanted some
payment”Aya’i answered: ” Yes, but isn ‘t money. Promise that lfat any time a cold wind through
my life, you will light the fire of fiiendship for me. ”.
Monty is this man, always ready to light the fire of friendship.