We Are Blessed
What makes me proud about this country?
In my mind, thats all any country really is.
But we do have freedom of speech.
Were able to be free, to walk free and to be who we are.
We should all be proud of that.
Well,Im a storyteller, and I do it through music.
These stories talk about the lifestyle and the people I grew up with.
Music lets us do that.
Its pure and its simple.
Its how real people tell ordinary stories.
It gives us a voice.
But really, Coat of Many Colors is more than just a song to me.
I wrote it from a special place in my heart about my mama.
It turns out to also be a song about bullying about not picking on other kids.
Its about love and family and believing.
It struck a chord with a lot of people, so theyve made a schoolbook out of it.
Im proud of that; I know my mama would be, too.
My daddy couldnt read or write, and I know it bothered him.
To honor him, I started theImagination Library.
I wanted to do my part to help kids fall in love with reading.
I am as proud of that program as anything I have done.
Weve given away almost 200 million books, and its still growing.
It is all over the U.S. and in many parts of the world.
I truly believe that you cant get enough books into the hands of children.
As a whole, I go where my heart leads me.
I pray every day that God will guide me, and I honestly believe he does.
Im trying my best to lift people up and do my part to make the world a better place.
People helping people, because its the right thing to do.
Record producer Owen Bradley allowed me to write and sing as I believed.
I never intended to be some woman activist, but I guess a lot of people related to it.
My sister, Bobbie, and I were raised by our grandparents.
For Thanksgiving one year, we split a can of soup!
Now, hard times have come again once more.
We are trying to hold on to each other and to your great American dream for every person.
If we dont find what unites us, we will again be a house divided.
We tried that in the 1860s, and 600,000 Americans died fighting each other.
