It’s been three months since Dolly Parton lost her husband of 60 years. The country music legend recently reflected that her steadfast faith in God and the promise of seeing her husband again someday has sustained her through one of the biggest changes in her life.
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame honoree spoke openly about her faith in a recent interview with the Associated Press while promoting her new single-serve Southern-inspired frozen meals. She told the outlet that she often misses her husband, Carl Dean, and reflects on many cherished memories.
“I am a person of faith, and I truly believe that I’m going to see him again someday. And I see him every day in my memories and in my heart, and in all the things that we used to do and all the things that we’ve built together,” said Parton. “You just kind of have to learn to kind of make new plans — but that’s the hardest part.”
Parton and Dean had been married for six decades before he passed away in March at the age of 82 in Nashville, Tennessee.
“I really feel his presence,” Parton recently shared. “I just try to go on, because I know I have to. And he was ill for quite a while, and part of me was at peace that he was at peace and not suffering anymore. But that still doesn’t make up for the loss and the loneliness of it.”
The couple’s love story began 62 years ago when they met outside a Wishy Washy Laundromat. Parton was 18 years old and had just moved to Nashville.
“I was surprised and delighted that while he talked to me, he looked at my face (a rare thing for me),” Parton described the meeting. “He seemed to be genuinely interested in finding out who I was and what I was about.”
Two years later and against the advice of her record label, Parton and Dean snuck across state lines to Georgia and got married in a small ceremony in Ringgold on Memorial Day. They hoped to keep the news out of the Tennessee newspapers.
Parton told CBN News in a 2016 interview that her husband was a “God-send.”
“I think my husband and my relationship was just really a God-send,” the 10-time Grammy winner said at the time. “God knew I was going to need somebody like him if I was going to be doing all this crazy stuff.”
Despite staying out of the limelight, Dean has served as the inspiration for her timeless hit “Jolene,” as well as her 2023 “Rockstar” album.
Parton says her husband would be proud of her for continuing her business ventures including the release of her new book in November, “Star of the Show: My Life on Stage,” and bringing “Dolly: An Original Musical,” to Broadway next year.
“I’ve always had dreams and I’m always working,” she shared. “My husband understood that. Carl knew that better than anybody and he was all about it. He was very proud of me. … So when I did lose him, I just thought, well, I’m going to take all of that energy, and I’m just going to put that back into other things, and I’ll keep him ever-present in everything that I do.”
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