Before the Rules Committee

Before the Rules Committee stands a doorkeeper. To this doorkeeper
there comes a Wiffler and asks to address the Committee, but the
doorkeeper says he cannot grant admittance at the moment. The Wiffler
thinks it over and then asks if he will be allowed to address the
Committee later. "It is possible," says the doorkeeper, "but not at the
moment." Since the gate stands open, as usual, and the doorkeeper steps
to one side, the Wiffler stoops to peer through the gateway into the
interior. Observing this, the doorkeeper laughs and says: "If you are
so attracted to it, just try to go in, despite my prohibition, but
notice, I am powerful and I am the least of the doorkeepers. From room
to room there is one doorkeeper after another, each more powerful than
the last. The third doorkeeper is so fierce that I am afraid to even
look at him." These are difficulties that the Wiffler has not
anticipated; the Rules Committee should be accessible to all, he thinks,
and at all times, but now, as he takes a look at the doorkeeper in his
team jersey, with his large forearms, he decides it is better to wait
until he gets permission to enter. The doorkeeper gives him a chair and
lets him sit down at one side of the door. There the Wiffler sits for
days and months and years. he makes many attempts to be granted
admittance and annoys the doorkeeper with his relentlessness. The
doorkeeper frequently has little conversations with him, asking him
questions about his home and family and many other things, but the
questions are posed with indifference and always finish with the
statement that the Wiffler can't be let in yet. The Wiffler, who has
equipped himself with many things for his journey, gives them all to the
doorkeeper as a bribe. The doorkeeper accepts everything, but always
with the remark: "I'm only taking it to keep you from thinking you have
forgotten anything." Over all the many years, the Wiffler fixes his
attention on the doorkeeper. He forgets the other doorkeepers, and this
first one seems to him the sole obstacle preventing access to the Rules
Committee. He curses his bad luck, boldly when he is younger, and
loudly, but as he grows older he only grumbles to himself. After a long
time his eyesight begins to fail him, but he doesn't know whether the
world is really darker or his eyes are just deceiving him. In his
darkness he is now aware of a radiant glow that emanates from the
gateway of the Rules Committee. He doesn't have long to live. Before
he dies, all his experiences force a question to the forefront of his
mind. One that he has never asked. He waves the doorkeeper over, since
he can no longer raise his arthritic body. The doorkeeper has to bend
low to hear him and says, "can you never be satisfied - what do you want
to know now?" "All players yearn to address the Rules Committee," says
the Wiffler, "so how come in all these years no one but myself has ever
begged to be let in." The doorkeeper recognizes that the Wiffler has
reached his end, and, in deference to his failed hearing, yells in his
ear: "No other Wiffler could ever be admitted to the Rules committee
through this gate, since it was made only for you and now I'm going to
shut it."