I have really been struggling within this past year to come upon things that I find interest in when it comes to books. I have been reading books continuously for the past fifteen years—and sometimes books that I have had no interest in—and it has been routinely harder and harder to keep myself interested in leisurely reading. And I know that no one wants to hear about my blasé struggle with reading as of late because who really cares, right? However, I think it’s important to listen to each other so that if you’re experiencing things, too, then it makes it easier to feel better about your experience (even if we’re talking about books and the struggle when it comes to reading).

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This past summer, I was working at a manufacturing company where I would get a few breaks throughout the day. Instead of sleeping or sitting on my phone for 10 to 20 minutes at a time, I decided that I needed to get my brain pumping. Of course, when I had mindless data-entry work to do, I would listen to podcasts, but I was even getting tired of listening to other people talk.

I went to Walmart one day after work where I was browsing through the book section trying to find something worth my time. That’s when I came upon Willie Nelson’s memoir: It’s a Long Story: My Life.

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I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect since I felt as though I was pretty well-informed on Mr. Nelson. But to be totally honest, what I got from the book was more than I could have ever asked.

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The book goes through the life of Nelson from his perspective, and it’s all fairly chronological. It starts off with his experience growing up with his grandparents as his parents, Myrle and Ira, became estranged from one another which resulted in estrangement from their two young children. Through reading, one comes to find out that Nelson’s strongest influences started in his earliest years. His grandfather, who passed early on in his life, gave Nelson his first guitar. And the rest is history.

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Nelson described how his grandmother’s strong, Christian influence inspired him to write his first song within the first few years of his life. Nelson even explained how his first performance, which was a poem that he recited, was one that he would never forget. From his deep, southern roots to his everlasting love for music, Nelson started off on the foot of many musicians.

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As he grew older, he found his way into his first family band with his sister, Bobbie, and her husband at the time named Bud Fletcher. Their band, “The Texans,” would traveled far and near from his hometown of Abbott, Texas where they would play at any small bar or venue that they could.

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He worked his way through the rest of the 400 page book telling stories of the first time that he held his babies with his first wife, to the times where he drank himself to the edge and had his truck set on fire, to the times he spent with lifelong friend, Waylon Jennings and all of the lessons that he brought him.

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It’s hard to review something that was already so well-said the first time around. I feel silly even beginning to try. I wouldn’t have imagined I would have gotten such an inside look at the life of one of the most well-known country artists to have ever lived, but it was truly an experience I will not forget. It makes me sad that you can only read a book once for the first time. I found myself at a point where I was really struggling -- personally and creatively. I felt as though I hadn’t written a damn good thing in months, and I felt that I was going nowhere fast in my head. After I sat down to read this beautiful work of art, I was floored by how Nelson’s voice, in a literary sense but more in the personal sense, spoke to me.

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This man is nearing his nineties, and I felt as though I was hearing exactly what I needed from a best friend. I think that’s something that is so appealing when it comes to artists. The ultimate goal is to find a way to spread your message in the most authentic and touching way possible, and it means that much more when there’s just an ebb and flow to the process.

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An American icon in every sense, Willie Nelson will go down in history for bringing edge to a world where edge is not welcome; for bringing a new light and perspective to a space that isn’t as progressive. That is truly the work of an artist. That is Willie Nelson.