This reminds me of the man who was driving down the road and his car breaks down near a monastery. He goes to the monastery, knocks on the door, and says, “My car broke down. Do you think I could stay the night?” The monks graciously accept him, feed him dinner, even fix his car. As the man tries to fall asleep, he hears a strange sound, a sound unlike anything he’s ever heard before. The sirens that nearly seduced Odysseus into crashing his ship comes to his mind. He doesn’t sleep that night, tossing and turning trying to figure out what could possibly be making such a seductive sound.

The next morning, he asks the monks what the sound was but they say, “We can’t tell you. You’re not a monk.” Distraught, the man is forced to leave. Years later, after never being able to forget that sound, the man goes back to the monastery and pleads for the answer again. The monks reply, “We can’t tell you. You’re not a monk.” The man says, “If the only way I can find out what is making that beautiful sound is to become a monk, then please, make me a monk.” The monks reply, “You must travel the earth and tell us how many blades of grass there are and the exact number of grains of sand. When you find these answers, you will have become a monk.” The man sets about his task and after years of searching, he returns as a gray-haired old man and knocks on the door of the monastery.

A monk answers the door and ushers him into the ageless building, unchanged from the last time he visited. He is taken before a gathering of all the monks. “In my quest to find what makes that beautiful sound, I traveled the earth and have found what you asked for. By design, the world is in a state of perpetual change. Only God knows what you ask. All a man can know is himself, and only then if he is honest and reflective and willing to strip away self deception.” The monks reply, “Congratulations. You have become a monk. We shall now show you the way to the mystery of the sacred sound.”

The monks lead the man to a rustic wooden door, where the head monk says, “The sound is beyond that door.” The monks give him the roughly shaped brass key and he opens the door. Behind the wooden door is another door made of stone. The man is given the expertly chiseled key to the stone door and he opens it, only to find a door made of ruby. And so it went that he needed keys to doors of emerald, pearl and diamond.

Finally, they come to a door made of solid gold; the sound has become very clear and definite at this proximity, The monks say, “This is the last key to the last door.” The man is apprehensive to no end – his life’s wish is behind that door! With trembling hands, he unlocks the door, turns the knob, and slowly pushes the door open. Falling to his knees, he is utterly amazed to discover the source of that haunting and seductive sound.

Suddenly blinded by a bright white light and a deep resonant force vibrating even the air in his lungs, the man passes out before reacting. He is awakened by the clopping of a horse walking on cobblestone, the creaking of a wooden cart, and the shaking of the stiff ride – a gentleman looks at him with a warm smile and says “Hey, you, you’re finally awake. You were trying to cross the border, right?”. The man, filled with a deep sense anticipation and relief, whispers to himself “Todd Howard, you’ve done it again.”