Dickens Revisited

There was a time in my youth that, upon reaching some unforeseen future,  I would pen the Great American Novel. Undoubtedly in my hometown of Asheboro, North Carolina, I was influenced by some of the best English teachers that ever trod the earth. They were the smart, sophisticated women who in subsequent generations would be seduced from the schoolhouse to the statehouse, lured from the classroom to the boardroom. From these teachers I learned to love literature and to appreciate that, as with all art, a novel is a lie that tells the truth. Although I've yet to write my novel, Mrs. Parsons' and Mrs. Snyder's lessons inspire me still.

As an eighth-grader, I was introduced to the work of Charles Dickens. A Christmas Carol was then and now a favorite of mine. Imagine with me the scene of Ebenezer Scrooge as the Ghost of Christmas Future points his bony finger at a tombstone upon which the protagonist's name is carved. Anquished, Scrooge cries out: "Spirit, are these the images of things that must be, or things that may be only?" From that passage grew an entire genre of alternative-futures literature.

Even now Dickens invites us to consider whether we walk a predetermined path or, if we alter but a single step, things might turn out differently.  We know how the novel ends. Scrooge wakes up a changed man with a changed future. In fact, we make our own future every day. We write now the end of the Triangle Leadership Academy story even as we live daily the future of our schools, departments, districts and organizations. To borrow a line from a popular 1980s film: I ain't afraid of no ghost. You shouldn't be either. Let's make this year the best one ever starting now!