I don’t know whether someone told me this or I read it somewhere, but tonight one of those wise-sounding phrases has been spinning around in my head – the kind of thing you’d proudly serve up at a dinner table. It goes like this: “Nothing ages you faster than fulfilled dreams.” (In a more radical version, the word “ages” might be replaced with “kills” – but let’s be honest, that’s already flirting with Nietzsche.)

I suppose I should begin by saying that this thought didn’t come to me without reason – tonight, after all, one of my oldest dreams finally came true: I saw Tom Waits live. No joke – the real Tom Waits, in the flesh, just like we’ve all seen him on CD covers, posters, or in films. He hasn’t put on weight, doesn’t look particularly old either – though he’s pushing sixty – his voice is still that same deep rasp, and even his hair is intact, unlike mine… What a bastard.

I don’t know why I used such a coarse word. Normally, I try to avoid that kind of thing, but somehow it fits. It fits because, try as I might, I can’t find anything in the entertainment world to compare Tom to. Every time I look for a category to slot him into, I reach the same conclusion: his category is a peculiar one, in the sense that it contains a single specimen. And the best term for it might be “force of nature.”

Yes, Tom reminds me much more of some strange natural formation than of anything born of showbiz – even among the greats who electrify millions with bursts of primal energy. Tom, as they say, is in a class of his own.

So there I was, watching him tonight, soaking in his incredible authenticity (at times you get the feeling he’s entirely forgotten the audience, simply telling a story – usually a sad one – because there’s no other way; it’s just how he’s made). Like it or not – he sings. I watched and kept wondering what he reminded me of. Deep down, from the darker folds of my consciousness, an image was trying to surface – but it struggled, gave me some trouble, until it finally popped up like a proverbial cork. Of course! Huck Finn! Huckleberry Finn – only older, wiser, and forced to live with a talent that has made him famous around the world, whether for his joy or his torment, who knows.

(And by the way – I don’t know if it matters, but as a kid I always preferred Tom Sawyer. He seemed cooler, cleverer, more refined, more ambitious… who knows. Only recently, perhaps under the weight of years, I’ve started to sense that Huck is the more real of the two. And the one holding the better cards, it seems to me – because unlike Tom, Huck has nothing to sell. Which, whether he likes it or not, condemns him to authenticity, to truth – for life.)

And so it is with this Tom, who really ought to be named Huck. He too seems condemned. Condemned in the same way Huck is, even though God gave him enough talent to sell – probably in any form he wants, after more than thirty years in the business – though it seems he doesn’t care. His concerts are always in small venues – small, at least by industry standards – a thousand people inside and a few hundred more shivering outside, hoping to snag one of the tickets that sold out in under two hours. Will they find one? Fat chance. Who would sell something so precious – even for twice or thrice the price?

And as for more concrete things, Tom is simply indescribable. As I said before, you really do feel sometimes that he’s forgotten about the audience. Or if not forgotten, then so absorbed in the task laid upon him that he has no time to even look around – even though a fair number of women (and some men) are screaming, howling, and swooning in front of him. When you see him standing in the middle of the stage, crooked as an old stump, stripped bare – not just of clothing but of skin, all exposed, howling nerves – you can’t help but feel, even for a moment, that some things are truly given to people from above. No questions asked, no permission granted. A summons from the grandpa who made us all. No money here – now go to work, son!

And Tom works. What else can he do? If he doesn’t, it won’t get any easier for him.

And thank God he does. Otherwise, the number of things in this world truly worth talking about would shrink by at least one. And given how few of those we have already…

October, 2004