Midwest Chick's Place

For this Monday, I’d like to point out Dolly Parton’s amazing work with the Imagination Library.  Which she funds from her OWN hard work.  This project gives books to children from birth to five years old whose parents sign them up.  The goal is to have kids and parents read together and to enhance literacy.

She just expanded this inestimable service into Missouri and Kentucky this past week, making children in 21 states and in some overseas countries eligible.

Despite all of her accomplishments in the music world, Parton looks at her Imagination Library as being one of her greatest achievements.

“The kids started calling me the ‘book lady,’” Parton said. “And Daddy was more proud of that than he was that I was a star. But Daddy got to feeling like he had really done something great as well.”

Parton is grateful that her father lived long enough to see the Imagination Library come to fruition.

“That was kind of my way to honor my dad, because the Bible says to honor your father and mother,” she said. “And I don’t think that just means, ‘just obey.’ I think it means to bring honor to their name and to them.”

 I was, and am, a voracious reader.  Thanks to my parents, I was always surrounded by books (I have 40 boxes of books in storage right now and my dressers are covered with new ones.  I also have 600 books on my Kindle).  I had teachers in a very, very small grade school who also encouraged me.  Reading expands the mind and allows the imagination to run wild.  I would get so far into a book that my dad would start messing with me and I didn’t even notice (tickling the top of my head, etc.).  The fact that he would do it for hours of fun says a lot about my concentration and his determination.

I can’t think of any celebrity who has given back more in such profound ways to her community and beyond, than Dolly.