Country music parallels

In 2003, just about to the day my son Isaac was born, Cherie got a call from her sister. Her sister and her husband were splitting up. It was a piece of very sad news for Cherie that I was glad was tempered by the birth of our son.

Her sister, Crystal, made a comment that she could no longer listen to country music because it was too sad to do so. Her husband, Eric, I guess, liked the genre of music.

For about six months after Cherie left, I stopped listening to the radio. I didn't have it on in the car, I never played it at home. It was, I guess, too sad for me. And that's saying a lot, because even now, I don't sing along to the radio as much as I used to. It just doesn't sound the same anymore.

But the lyrics? I listen to them intently now. There are so many songs that have added meaning to me now, and I could go on for a long time. Here are just a few:

Chris Cagle -- "I Breathe In, I Breathe Out"
Keith Urban -- "Making Memories of Us"
Zac Brown Band -- "Whatever it Is"
Taylor Swift -- "You Belong With Me"
and my current favorite, Lady Antebellum, "I Need You Now."

Some may consider these songs cheesy pop with a steel guitar and occasional fiddle, and that's fine, but they have words with definite meanings in them. I never really paid attention to the lyrics of a song before, but I realize that most songs by most artists in most generes (there are obvious exceptions, of course) are talking about love in some form.

Country music, I believe, says it more often and better than most. There was a time that it was very difficult for me to listen to the radio, and especially country music, because my wife and I shared such good memories of listening to that music. It still is hard to listen to this type of music, and it's even hard to sing some of it. I sang a song on Friday -- Ty Herndon's "Living in a Moment" that talks about two people finding each other after suffering lost loves. When I sang that song, I was genuinely thinking about making things right with Cherie so that I might be able to sing it to her at one point.

I think people at the bar where I sang it enjoyed it too. It's not terribly complex, the song, and it's about 10 years old, but it meant something to someone enough for the gentleman to record it.

Before I was married or in a relationship, I used to wonder what it would be like to sing a song to a special someone, to express my love for them with words and music. I know exactly what that's like now, except that I'm back at square one, trying to figure it out all over again.