In his younger days he used to look like a young Jimmy Stewart. Always, wearing a suit and tie and saying, “Yes, Ma'am,” to the ladies. And he was in love with the most beautiful girl on the east coast. She wore yellow dresses in the summer time and she always smelled of fresh peach cobbler pie. They planned to get married when the summer was over. Her name was Jenny. Tom had been attending college but his funds dried up when he needed to pay the medical expenses for his ill mother. Without being a student, Tom was drafted to Vietnam. Jenny said that she would wait for him, and write him every week, and she did. She wrote every week for eleven months. But Tom became a prisoner of war after his helicopter was shot down and he spent six years as a POW . His cell mates were John McCain and the author of Rambo. In fact as it turns out the legend of Private Tom Sikes is what inspired the novel First Blood. You know Bruce Willis’s story in Pulp Fiction, the fighter whose dad had a gold watched shoved up his ass for six years, yep Sikes inspired that too. The Deer Hunter? Him too. Tom escaped the POW camp by playing a game of Russian Roulette with the Viet Cong. The war was long over, and Tom Sikes was thought to be dead. He swam a third of the way back and boat hopped the rest until he hit the east coast again.
He came back from the war and the world had changed. He was thought dead and people had moved on. The war had changed Sikes, and he was hardly recognizable anymore. He couldn’t even recognize himself but he thought of one person that might. Jenny. But she wasn’t there anymore. She had moved on out west. And Tom sought to find her. He walked across the great nation that he had fought for. With no shoes it was a long and painful journey. But his love for her carried him on. And then he found her. One day while feeding bread from his sandwich to pigeons in the park, he looked up and saw her walking by. But she wasn’t alone. Jenny had thought Tom Sikes to be dead. He was dead in her heart, and a long time ago she had moved on. Tom would have let it go. He would have walked away and let her be. But her new lover was the unknown man that had killed Bambi’s mom and Tom couldn’t honestly let that shit slide. Jenny deserved the best, not the worst. On February 13, 1979 Tom Sikes entered their home and while the unknown man was sleeping, Tom shot him dead with every bullet that he had in his pocket. Jenny woke; she saw a figure standing there with the smoking gun his hand. But it wasn’t Tom. It wasn’t the man that she loved so long ago. You see, Tom never came back from the war. Tom Sikes died in Vietnam and the man standing above her was not him. Her name was Jenny. But he was the Rooster.
That was the last she ever saw of him. That was last that anyone ever saw of him. The Rooster continued on from one town to the next city, stumbling upon a new adventure every week. The Rooster has been the faceless name of every moment around us. He is the character only mentioned in stories, but never seen. Jeff Lebowski co-authored the original draft of the Port Huron Statement. Rooster was the other. He even freed Willy. But long ago, in a late December, the Rooster battled Satan at the cross roads. An epic struggle it was. And the Rooster gave it his all, but he did not win, and the devil took his mind. As easily as God scattered the tongues of the people at the Tower of Babel, the Devil scrambled Rooster’s mind leaving him with lost hope, memories, and dreams.
Years following, the Rooster eventually found shelter in a little city called Ogden. And if you pay attention enough you’ll see him on the streets, often riding his bike or pushing his shopping cart. I’ve seen the Rooster many times. And I’ve seen the shadow that cast behind him. I now know what that is. For a long time I had thought the Rooster was alone, but he isn’t alone at all.
If you do spot the Rooster, look closely, and you’ll see as well that he is not alone. Because behind him is the shadow of Tom Sikes.
