OPEN MIKE NIGHT

It was after midnight. A small room in a smaller town on a blue highway. About twenty people sitting around drinking beer, one guy is playing drums too loud, another cowboy is playing basic blues rhythms on a cheap guitar. It's open mike night. Nothing going on. A group of bored people sitting around an old hotel bar. And then a unkempt homeless looking guy with shoulder length hair straps on his guitar and steps up upon the bandstand. Suddenly the room grows quiet. The man is a stranger. Soon it becomes evident that the man has spent time with his guitar. The cowboy and the drummer begin to pay attention and even the bored barmaid from hell grows quiet. We all gaze on, as the stranger takes the entire room to a new level. We all began rooting for the guy with the old abused guitar and quite quickly our wishes are answered. This man can play!

But then, just as quickly, he just lays his guitar aside, walks over, sits down at a table by himself and finishes his beer. The mood is broken. Everyone returns to their drink and resumes watching the cowboy and the drummer struggle through yet another 10 choruses of Honky Tonk. Then, once again, the stranger lays aside his beer, straps on his guitar with the ease of one meeting an old lover and joins the dysfunctional duo on the stage. And off he goes once again. Not perfectly but better than anyone in the room has ever heard this side of a $50 concert ticket. This man could play! He is too old and too sloppy to ever be great but he can still and will always be able to shock a room, and in the end that’s what open mike nights are all about. Send in the budding genius, the might be, the could be, the should be, the use to be, even the has been. And please dear Lord, SHOCK this room. Shock this room until all the bar flies and barmaids from hell grow quiet and once again, let this moment, in this place, be filled with promise…and Magic.