Just 'cause I've lived in the gitter, mosquitoes bitin' my ankles and rats chewin' my balls, don't mean I know where this boy was comin' from. The cat I'm talkin 'bout is Ted Hawkins, and this boy was speakin' the gospel. He knowed the sour mouth of a wine bottle and the scratchy twang of an old guitar. He was singin' the blues with a hopeful growl that made the hair from the tops of my toes to my tippy top head go all prickly. Makes me wanna wake up for another day, knowin' Ted's gonna be there.

Sure, there've been other men done what Ted done. Otis Redding-- people always tole me Ted sounded like Otis. I think Otis sounded like a man comf'table, but Ted just sounded hopeful. He played down there at the beach and nobody seemed to care that he was makin' songs like eatin' Goobers. Now I hear they puttin' them shiny new records out of his music. He never got big fer 'imself, he knew where we was comin' from.

They played his record for me a couple of times, and tole me they came from his 30- year "career." I shore never knew Ted had a career, an' I ain't none too sure he knew hisself. He played with heart more than most, but never wept into his songs like those others. His music always did my heart proud to hear it, made me proud of m'self, made me proud to hear it, it shined like gold. It ain't complicated, it ain't hard to see, y'just gotta look.

-James P. Wisdom