Dolly Parton, 79, is processing the grief of losing her husband of almost 60 years, Carl Dean, by putting some things “on hold”—including new music.
Parton told Khloé Kardashian on the Wednesday episode of the Khloé In Wonderland podcast that there are “several things I’ve wanted to start, but I can’t do it. I will later, but I’m just coming up with such wonderful, beautiful, you know, ideas. But I think I won’t finish it. I can’t do it right now because I got so many other things and I can’t afford the luxury of, you know, of getting that emotional right now.”
Parton’s notoriously private husband died at their home in Nashville in March, at the age of 82. She later revealed that he’d been “ill for quite ill for quite a while, and part of me was at peace that he was at peace and not suffering anymore.” She added, “But that still doesn’t make up for the loss and the loneliness of it.”
Soon after his passing Parton released the song, “If You Hadn’t Been There,” which she dedicated to him, but told Kardashian that the heartbreaking tribute is where she’s drawing the line for now, as she balances her projects. Last month, she announced she was returning to the Vegas stage for the first time in 32 years, with a limited residency at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. She’s staying up beat, even though the loss is still so fresh.
“My husband passed away three months ago,” Parton said on the podcast Wednesday. “When you ask me if there’s stuff that I’ve started, haven’t finished… there are times like that, things like that that would will stall you a little bit. But I’ll write something else though, if it comes. I’m just putting that all on hold.”
Parton also reflected on what made her and Dean a great match for so many years. “I’m not one of those people that has to have somebody around me all the time,” she said, and Dean was the yin to her yang in that sense.
“In fact, I don’t like it. I mean, I have to be out in the public and I belong to the public, but I am such a private person and my husband was as well. And that was the thing with us,” she added. “We were so good for each other because he’s a total loner. But we could just be in the house all day and say two or three words—didn’t matter. Or we could talk all afternoon and lay in bed, talk at night, you know, in the dark.”
