Dear Clay:
Are you familiar with "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner"?
(Hey! Come back here! I have to get my money’s worth of out my degree in English literature…)
In the Coleridge poem, the old sailor is haunted for slaying the bird that was the harbinger of good fortune. He laments his fate and the burden he must bear:
Ah ! well a-day ! what evil looks
Had I from old and young !
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.
Lately I’ve seen repeated references to your own personal albatross cropping up here and there in the press in the form of “doesn’t know his place, isn’t grateful.” In articles from that time two years ago to as recently as last month, you have said again and again how much you appreciated the opportunities the show afforded you --- that sounds like acknowledgment and gratitude to me. You were wise enough, though, to know that a ship cannot test its seaworthiness by staying in the port. You were the young traveler, and it was time to move on.
For a while it seemed your first ship was yar, but it was not shipshape at all: your talent, and Ruben’s and that of the second season crew kept it on course for a while. After you all disembarked, it did not take long to discover that the fancy paint on the Good Ship American Idol concealed cracks in the deck, leaks in the hull and a ship’s owner who seems to care more about the price he was paid to carry his passengers than the experience of their journey. Instead of putting the best sailors in charge of getting the ship safely out of dock, now they are scuttling that ship while it is still in the harbor. When they put the seasick and the directionless at the helm at the beginning of every new voyage, it gets harder and harder to convince anyone, days after it has gotten underway, that the ship suddenly has an able crew. You put in such good service. Why should it be your job to stay below decks forever, bailing water, when you deserve to seek out horizons of your own?
It is strange that those who could have become your steadfast navigators chose instead to try to steer your ship onto the rocks. Instead of leading you through the storm, they attacked you with “evil looks” and cutting words and, like in a Hitchcock nightmare, continued to peck at you without provocation. Long after you had passed from their land, they pursued you and continued to peck… and peck… and peck. Perhaps they are an irritant and not a danger, but how could you be blamed for “slaying” that bird when you could? The winds had shifted and the omens were bleak. Enough: captain your own ship and set the course you want to sail.
I have often seen it said that we never would have found you had you not boarded that particular vessel, but I respectfully disagree.
There is a thing that some call destiny, some call fate, some call providence. Yours is to be exactly where you are at exactly this time of your life. Had that ship sailed without you, here is what might have happened instead. A freshman from Raleigh might have packed a copy of your demo in her suitcase as she headed for college, and found as her new roommate the daughter of an A&R man in Los Angeles. A record executive from Nashville might have visited family in Wake County and spent a Saturday evening with them listening to some of the local talent at the Hometown/North Carolina Music Connection. And that voice, that glorious voice, would have rung out strong and true until it found the ears that would hear it.
When the question arises of why you were not found sooner, I’ve come to believe that it was not your time to begin your far journey, because there were things you had yet to learn much closer to home. The other maps had yet to be drawn, the distant voyage yet to be charted, the provisions and supplies for the long odyssey were not yet in the hold. You had not learned the skills you needed to make all of the journeys ahead of you and to build all of the ships you will sail. Without your experiences from age 18 to 24, for instance, how could there have been a ship called Bubel/Aiken?
No, there is always more than one route and if yours has sometimes been through tempest and through gale, perhaps that was meant to test the worthiness of your vessel. Turns out the years you spent building it, testing it and learning the lessons of life served you well.
Alright then, we’re almost into port now --- I can’t extend this metaphor forever. There will come a time when the albatross --- the stigma --- of American Idol is finally lifted off your neck. Already I see the weight beginning to lessen. Without a doubt, you are the most successful of your old shipmates in terms of sales and the most successful in the variety of your major accomplishments, including executive producing your own television show, landing on the New York Times Best Sellers list and being named a UNICEF ambassador. Chart topper. Record breaker. Five times platinum. Producer. Best Seller. Ambassador. These are a few of the other names to call you now, and they are being used more and more as time passes.
So where will your journey take you next?
I fervently hope, with all the ports you will stop in and all who you will meet along the way, that you will find the songs that speak to your soul.
And may the day soon come when what you have created is a true reflection of the self you are trying to reveal, in sound and in message. Then you will have built the vessel of your own creation, one that will carry you safely and confidently to the destinations of your choosing. It will be a ship of surpassing beauty and elegance, with a nimble touch as it moves through the waves. It will be built with your own hand, with the willing assistance of this band of crewmates who are happy and eager to travel with you.
And when you are ready to name it, there will be just one name that comes to mind. It will not be a compromise or a promise for the future. That name will no longer limit you, no longer be a minuscule part of who you are and what you will become. It will be, through toil and struggle and sacrifice, through vision and courage and artistry, the ship that deserves to be called, quite simply ---
“Clay Aiken”.
There is a lamp in my window, and I wait for your return. Enjoy your journeys, and Godspeed.
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