Congratulations Tom Waits Look-A-Like!

People thought you were a fool for entering this contest, and perhaps they were right. Who would want to admit they look like one of the most weathered and road worn men of ours or any generation?

Apparently quite a few people, judging by the contest fairgrounds. They’ll be filled with pock faced men with deep sad eyes wearing hats and collared shirts, carrying guitars and the weight of the world on their shoulders. They’ll all look a little bit like Tom Waits, but they won’t have the edge you have: a bit of Tom Wait’s own DNA.

Let’s take a step back.

You’re not just some dude. You’re actually a government project designed to make really sad music in order to make terrorists see America as a nation as a more sensitive and less bomb-able place. So they put some Fiona Apple, some Tom Waits and some Aretha Franklin all into one package and, since Tom Waits looked saddest of the three of them, they slapped his face on y’all.

But you escaped from the government facility designed to contain you through a combination of deep, soulful singing and murder and now you’re on the run, looking to make a life for yourself so you can go to ground and avoid being taken back and dissected by the government or worse, taken to Iraq and Afghanistan where you’ll be forced to play an endless stream of USO shows.

Which is why you’re at this contest. A little bit of recognition, so long as it’s not covered by the papers, never hurt anyone. And there’s no way any newspaper ever would cover a Tom Waits look-a-like contest. So it’s a chance to make yourself known in a community that might value you and to get a little much needed cash if you win the prize.

So you’ll come to that dusty fairground in Wyoming and you’ll sit under a tree, guitar in hand, singing to yourself in a voice which has both Tom Wait’s leathery quality, Aretha’s soul and Fiona’s trilling melody. You’ll sing low and strong and the sound will carry to the whole fairground. People closer to you will start crying without knowing why, while people farther away will consider calling young loves long lost. Everyone will be drawn to you, whether they know it or not, and your siren song.

After around an hour or two of all this subtle crooning the entire fairground will have assembled around you. They’ll be captivated by the sound of your voice, and it’ll be obvious that the contest is yours. But that’s when something unexpected will happen.

A black Cadillac will arrive, rolling across the grass like it’s the smoothest of roads. When it comes to a stop the brakes won’t make but a sound. Instead they’ll inaudibly hiss. And when the door opens and those boots hit the ground it’ll be like an angel stepped to earth. Your song will stop and the air will go still.

“Looks like you won the contest,” Tom Waits will say from under the brim of his hat. He’ll push it up only after his voice has issued its gristle, and then just to look you in the eye, to fix your soul with the light of his vision. “Want to come on the road?”

You’ll smile at him, a thing crafted of leather and the sweat of a half decade of sorrow brewed in a government lab, and hop to your feet.

“Let’s go,” you’ll tell him with a nod, and he’ll nod back. The two of you will walk to his Cadillac side by side, wordless against the storm that you can now feel forming behind you, threatening to consume both you and Tom Waits.

Congratulations Tom Waits Look-A-Like!