Reading Jacket Covers

Recently, my son was listening to song samples on iTunes. He asked, “Daddy why do they call them albums?” I told him they used to be called albums before CDs came out…you know…back in the olden days. (I‘m not really sure why iTunes refers to them as albums…are they files?) My son was really into Taylor Swift…so I thought I would surprise him later that night and buy the album…I mean CD. He was so excited to get the CD open he almost snapped it! Smile.

CD is open…CD is playing…Taylor is singing…he reaches for the CD container…opens it…looks at the picture…pulls out the cover…opens it…and begins reading the Jacket Cover. I know to most of you…this means nothing, but to me…wow…it melted my heart, the way something only a son does to his father can-it touched my heart!

I’ve been reading Jacket Covers since I was 15. When I was 15, I remember buying Amy Grant’s album, Age to Age. Okay…technically it didn’t come with a jacket cover…it had an album sleeve. I read it. I read it again…and again. I have always related to words in a profound way…so reading the lyrics to her songs brought the album to life and touched my fragile heart. It was a way for me, the consumer, to know the artist, Amy Grant. That was the day Amy became my friend! She is still a friend today…and has been through out all of my life. Always there, always with the right thing to say:

When all goodbyes are said and done
And nighttime finds you home
Are you alright to spend a night
Of being all alone
Or do you hide between the lines
Of conversations past
A wall of words, a heart unheard
That hides behind a mask

I'm raining on the inside
My heart wells up with tears that start to pour
I'm raining on the inside
But Your cries of love break through
And I fall in love with You once more

When friends who care can't be there
To ease away my pain
And peace of mind is hard to find
Like sunlight in the rain
God sees my heart, the deepest part
Inside this lonely me
And reachin' in, His love begins
To heal the heart in me
(lyrics from “Raining on the Inside,” a song from Age to Age, the album)

Yes…even at 15, my heart related to rain on the inside and the need to know God. I’m glad my son, Garrison, enjoys a sanguine inspired lyric…rather than the melancholy inspired lyrics my heart is inclined to love.

Today, he did it again. He reached for the CD container…opened it…pulled out the cover…opened it…and began reading the lyrics found inside the Jacket Cover. (Taylor is a singer-songwriter so the lyrics were included) He actually read the lyrics and my heart leaped! I was so excited.

We talked about her songs…the way her voice sounds…what certain words mean…what the song means…and what we liked about the song. He really liked this one song…it had been on repeat (something else I do.) So I asked, what is it that you like about this song? He thought about it…looked at me…then very profoundly said, “ Sometimes you just like a song!” The moment was sealed in my heart forever and another song was added to the soundtrack of my life!

I long to find friends who do this! Who connect to a song the way I do? For someone who is willing to talk about it…I mean this is what I do…usually alone, sometimes with a special friend, but now-TODAY- with my son. What a joy…a validation of sorts that this boy has my blood in him. But, there he was reading the jacket cover. The melancholy in me engaged. I analyzed. And, on my hour drive back to Oklahoma City after dropping him off in Lawton Oklahoma, I thought about the wonderful gifts he has from me and his mother. He has a wonderful blend of both our physical make-up and our personality make-up. He is a funny guy…much like his mother. Well the funny part…not the guy part! (See…that was my poor attempt at humor.) But at times…he looks in deep, just like his Dad!

What kind of legacy am I leaving him? (I rarely stay on surface level…I’m usually stay in the deep end) I love that he has a heart for music…so clearly evident, even at eleven. He hears the instruments and loves to sing. He lets music in…it affects him the way a song affects me…but I want to leave him more.

I want to live my life in way that inspires him to be a Godly Man! I want him to be a man of integrity and excellence. A man who respects and serves others. In my frailty, in my humanness, I am often far from any of these, but part of being a man of God is knowing how to get up when you fall. Knowing what it means to pray a honest prayer of repentance and letting God in-in every area of your heart. I’m doing that. I’m walking a journey of faith…one that isn’t always pretty, or better said, is Sometimes Hallelujah, but it’s a journey that is beginning to reflect Christ and this is the legacy he will have. I get excited about sharing my life with my son when he is a man. He will see all the pages of my life and the one thing…that will truly be clear is that I fought hard to learn how to surrender to the obedience of Christ. I am even proud now…to tell him how I’m changing…how the man I was is no longer the man I am. This is the legacy not the life of lyrics, loneliness and guitar strings he will know. I wonder what songs we will share then…

I used to have to trap my friends in a vehicle on long drives to share a solid lyric, a new song that had been added to the soundtrack of my life, or some interesting detail I learned about a song or an artist from a Jacket Cover. About two years ago that moved from a locked vehicle to a couch. When I met a heart much like mine, in my friend Kristen. In fact, I miss couch time with my friend…this was a time that often included lyrics, songs and tears. I believe that we will get that again one day…just like one day my son and I will share a new song or something he discovered from Reading Jacket Covers.

Written by James Avery Tucker

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