I posted this on insta and it blew up! So many fans thought I was hating on Dolly-- which I'm not. I love Dolly. I'm hating on our endless youth anti-aging culture that got us to this point. We are so brainwashed we don't even know we have bought into it. The Beauty industry/ plastic surgeons/ media all thrive on our insecurities about our looks. They make billions of dollars a year convincing us NOT to age naturally. They want us to fight it every step of the way...and many buy into this. But I am not!
There are so many more interesting things about me and you than how we look.
Like... How you feel. Your passions. Your dreams. Talents. How much you care about others. The way you treat people. What you think about, plan, and explore. What excites you.
And what I loved most about Dolly was her generosity, big heart, inclusion, talent, and humor. Her looks kind of made me sad..because they became so Barbie-like. I wanted to see the "real" Dolly.
My feelings about Dolly Parton are complicated.
I put Coat of Many Colors on repeat yesterday morning after hearing Dolly passed, sitting with a complicated ache in my chest.
I loved Dolly Parton with my whole heart. Her songwriting, her humor, her generosity, and the way she poured love into people was pure magic.
Watching her over the decades brought a quiet sadness too. She spent half a century turning into an exaggerated, plastic version of herself to stay visible in the spotlight. She even joked about it. The tiny waist, the endless procedures, and the fear of letting a single natural line show on camera.
An eighty-year-old woman does not look like smooth porcelain without a team of surgeons.
When a cultural powerhouse feels pressured to erase every trace of time, think about the message that hands down to the next generation. It teaches girls in their twenties that getting older is a personal failure. It tells them their future faces are something to dread, carve up, and hide before anyone notices they lived.
If an icon as brilliant and beloved as Dolly never felt safe letting eighty look like eighty, we will never get to see what real, dignified aging even looks like.
I am sitting here in my bright thrifted cardigan with all my sun spots and laugh lines in full view, wondering if you felt that same ache watching her over the years?
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