I remember the first time my grandmother read me a story and the world that opened up beyond my little eyes. I also remember how soon after this event I decided that I wanted to be a teacher like her.

I was somewhere around two years old, maybe three…. I certainly had no idea who Dolly Parton was—that would come much later in life and by then, she was the butt of many jokes in my household as all my father could see was an outspoken woman with big breasts—but I remember when I first heard...