Socrates was sitting beneath an olive tree when a man appeared wearing round purple glasses, black clothes, several silver crosses, and an expression suggesting he had survived both history and himself.
SOCRATES: Good day. May I ask who you are?
OZZY: That’s a difficult question already. I only got here.
SOCRATES: An excellent beginning. Most people answer too quickly.
OZZY: I’m Ozzy.
SOCRATES: Is that your essence or merely your name?
OZZY: Depends who’s asking. The tax man gets one answer. The fans get another.
SOCRATES: Then perhaps we should begin with what remains when names disappear.
OZZY: Usually a hangover.
SOCRATES: Ah. Is a hangover the soul protesting against the body?
OZZY: It’s the body protesting against the soul having too much fun.
Socrates smiled.
SOCRATES: Tell me, Ozzy, why do people fear you?
OZZY: Because somebody once said I bit the head off a bat.
SOCRATES: Did you?
OZZY: That’s not really the important question anymore.
SOCRATES: Then what is?
OZZY: Why one mistake gets remembered longer than a thousand songs.
Socrates folded his hands.
SOCRATES: You suggest reputation is less truthful than memory.
OZZY: Memory’s a terrible editor. It keeps the explosions and cuts the conversations.
SOCRATES: Then fame resembles a bad historian.
OZZY: Exactly.
SOCRATES: You have shouted before great crowds?
OZZY: Millions.
SOCRATES: Did they make you wiser?
Ozzy laughed for nearly a minute.
OZZY: No. Louder.
SOCRATES: Then applause is not evidence of truth.
OZZY: If it were, every football chant would be philosophy.
Socrates nodded approvingly.
SOCRATES: You surprise me.
OZZY: Everybody says that after they stop expecting me to be an idiot.
SOCRATES: Tell me. Why does mankind delight in loud music?
OZZY: Same reason your students liked difficult questions.
SOCRATES: Which is?
OZZY: It wakes them up.
Socrates became thoughtful.
SOCRATES: I spent my life trying to awaken Athens.
OZZY: I spent mine trying to wake Birmingham.
SOCRATES: Which city listened better?
Ozzy looked toward the horizon.
OZZY: Hard to say. They both kept making the same mistakes.
A silence settled between them.
Finally Socrates spoke.
SOCRATES: They condemned me for corrupting the youth.
Ozzy grinned.
OZZY: They blamed me for exactly the same thing.
SOCRATES: Did you?
OZZY: Probably not.
SOCRATES: Nor did I.
They both laughed.
After a while Socrates asked one final question.
SOCRATES: If death comes tomorrow, what remains?
Ozzy removed his glasses.
“My mistakes,” he said. “My songs. The people I loved. And if I’m lucky, somebody hears one of those and decides life is just weird enough to keep going another day.”
Socrates stood.
“My friend,” he said, “that is philosophy.”
Ozzy scratched his head.
“I thought it was heavy metal.”
“Perhaps, they are closer than either of us imagined.”