Jack O’Day wasn’t tall. He wasn’t educated, wasn’t funny, and wasn’t very handsome. What he was, though, was the best guitar picker that never got picked up. His broad hands, (Potato Hands, he would disparage) danced and jumped and slid among the strings. Sometimes his hands even surprised himself. He would let them go wild and at the end of a song, he’d open his eyes and not know one lick of what he’d played. Jack picked his way through the roadhouses and honky-tonks of the South. Each time, he’d leave behind hand-rolled cigarette butts and women who would have him in their beds if he came back. He never played on his own, always hopping along or joining a session of a bigger name. The people who came out for the Names didn’t notice Jack. But he wasn’t playing for them. The marks who paid the door price. The fans who came with their shiny records for signatures. Jack played for the set that would’ve been at the bar anyway. He played for the old-timers sitting at the counter, the pretty not-so-young things still spackled into their jeans, the hustlers leaning over the pool tables, and the off-shift single moms having their little moments of peace. These were Jack O’Day’s clan. And they could tell. Jack’s hands would find a little melody and his listeners would pause. The grizzled men would nod and hum in their near stupors and the waitress moms would sigh. The too thin pool sharks would tilt their heads, eyes unfocused, and the too tanned good time gals would unclench their hands around their beers. If Jack’s hand were on, if they had gone wild, he’d feel them lean towards him. His music would billow out around him in waves and they, not knowing they were thirsty, would drink it in.
Katherine's Journal 