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Gillian Brockell
@gillianbrockell.com

This girl I used to waitress with in Austin, we moved to New York together in 2003 on a literal Greyhound bus. Shared a fifth floor walk-up studio that, when it rained, had more leaks in the ceiling than we had pots and pans. We used to get drunk and smoke off the fire escape and do “sad-offs.”

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C’Mongoose
@uat4life.bsky.social

#Dolly was a beautiful person and I’m not talking about the plastic surgery. bsky.app/profile/uat4...

C’Mongoose@uat4life.bsky.social

Once upon a time, we couldn’t afford our own books. #Dolly grew up that way too. When she could do something about it, she did! I don’t have millions to fund a library but I can spare a few bucks to Dolly’s amazing program. #booksky #books #BeKind #AnythingsBetterThanNothing imaginationlibrary.com

imaginationlibrary.comDolly Parton's Imagination Library | USA, UK, IE, CA, AUDolly Parton’s Imagination Library is a book gifting program that mails free books to children from birth until they begin school in participating areas.
Gillian Brockell
@gillianbrockell.com

A sad-off is when you go back and forth playing sadder and sadder songs at full blast until you’re both too inconsolable to play another. Dolly Parton’s “Down from Dover” won the whole tournament. One of the most light-hearted people to ever live gave us the saddest song in the world. Thank you.

not my monkey's paw, not my serkis...
@notmymonkeymon.bsky.social

been fortunate to know several people, related to a few, who, despite having gone through hell, & perhaps bc of it, they were most kind, considerate & often lighthearted people I have ever known. I think dolly, like them, had seen enough heartbreak to understand that you can't carry it & stay human.

Gillian Brockell
@gillianbrockell.com

A two-story barbecue restaurant in Times Square “took a chance” on me because I aced the barbecue fundamentals test without having to study. All the other servers were aspiring Broadway, including this gay blond guy in his thirties who loved Dolly so much that when I told him about the “sad-off”

Gillian Brockell
@gillianbrockell.com

winner, he said “Which version?” Whew. I didn’t even know about 1970. Wikipedia was just a tiny baby then and hadn’t gotten to “obscure Dolly Parton” just yet. I asked him once why he loved her so much — because he really loved her, like interrupted-you-every-shift-to-talk-about-her loved her —

Gillian Brockell
@gillianbrockell.com

and he said when he was a baby he had terrible colic. Cried day and night. His mom was a young military bride, all alone on a base in Germany, and tried everything she could to help her baby feel better — swaddling, rocking, different formula, long walks, tummy massage — but he was inconsolable.