Blue Like Jazz

I read the book Blue Like Jazz by Don Miller, two Summers ago in a car on the way home from Colorado. My parents were sitting in the front seat with the windows rolled down because while we were out of town the AC in our car went out. I was sitting in the backseat next to a cooler filled with bottled water and Diet Rite, with a blanket on my lap and my pillow with it's purple patterned pillowcase sitting next to me. We were listening to the Cd Emotionalism by The Avett Brothers. I spent that Summer memorizing that Cd. I turned it on when I took showers in the basement of my Aunt's cabin in CO and hummed the melodies as I washed my hair. I fell asleep every night listening to The Sparrow and the Crow by William Fitzsimmons partly because it was soothing and partly because it drowned out the snoring that arose from my parents, nearly 15feet away from where I slept. That Summer I wrote the song I'm All In and started the journey of figuring out that I could actually pursue this as a career, and in fact, I would be insane not to because there is nothing else in the world I wanted (and still want) more. Reading Blue Like Jazz with the cool breeze brushing over me and the mountains out my window, I discovered what it really means to love people. That book changed, or rather, enhanced what I knew about being a Christian and what it really meant to love everyone. The reason I am bringing all of this up, is because I just watched Blue Like Jazz the movie (which came out in 2012). I had no idea it was a movie, and watching it today curled up with a blanket and pillow, I could feel the mountain air and hear faintly The Avett Brothers singing about shame, with the kind of harmony that is only found when two brothers sing about something they care about. I came home that Summer with a head full of songs and a fresh breath of air that I found in the lungs of Blue Like Jazz.