CARLTON FLETCHER: Dolly Parton concert is bucket-list worthy

And I will always love you.

— Dolly Parton

In today’s hurry-up world in which we all feel a sense of — sorry to infringe on one of this region’s favorite code words — entitlement, we often forget to appreciate the good things we’re given.

That hit me recently when, during a conversation with my sister, I casually told her I’d gone to see Dolly Parton in concert recently. Her reply: “That’s always been on my bucket list.”

It was after my sister’s proclamation that it dawned on me what a gift I’d been given. (Thanks, Mike.) But it was during Dolly’s performance that I realized what a gift we who love music had been given when she started her improbable career some 57 years ago.

At 70, Parton is still an amazing entertainer, her voice as crystal clear and as powerful as it was when she first released “Dumb Blonde” way back in 1966. The emotion in her voice can still drag tears from the hardest of listeners as she sings of loss, family and the hardscrabble existence she overcame on her way to superstardom.

(Note: Listening to “Coat of Many Colors,” “My Tennessee Mountain Home,” “Hard Candy Christmas” and others was like an extended therapy session.)

I’d always had a deep appreciation for Dolly’s music, but until seeing her live at the Gwinnett Infinite Energy Center, I’d never considered myself a true fan. As she brought out all the familiar songs of the ’70s and ’80s, though — songs like “Here You Come Again,” “9 to 5,” “Islands in the Stream,” “Why’d You Come in Here Looking Like That,” “Real Love,” “Two Doors Down,” “Love Is Like a Butterfly” — I realized how big an impact she’d had on not only country music, but popular music as well.

And then there was “Jolene.”

I fell in love with “Jolene” when I heard Jack White’s version. I’ve since heard it sung by a dozen or so entertainers, from Ellie Goulding to Miley Cyrus to some random hopeful on “The Voice.” But hearing Dolly tell the story behind the story — it’s true, it turns out, a slice of life in which Dolly wondered why her future husband, Carl Dean, who briefly joined her onstage in Atlanta, was spending so much time at the bank, so she followed him there one day and met the real “Jolene” — and then hearing her sing it live was close to spiritual for me.

(Note 2: To all you would-be Dolly imitators … Save your flattery for other songs in her catalog. No one can do “Jolene” justice.)

Dolly was touching as she told about growing up poor in Tennessee, she was eloquent as she recounted some of the stories of her childhood and how the love of her family remained intact and served as something of a muse for her in her career. And she was funny as hell.

“I’m thinking of running for president,” she said. “What’s two more boobs in the White House?” Her fertile mom, she noted, always seemed to “have one in her and one on her.” And then, when someone yelled out “I love you, Dolly” in a moment of quiet between songs, she said, without missing a single beat, “I thought I told you to stay in the truck.”

She played guitar, piano, dulcimer, fiddle, banjo and some kind of tin whistle, all with flair. (I didn’t buy her sax playing, though. I think it was more of a stage bit.)

And, oh yeah, Dolly sang “I Will Always Love you.”

She waited until she’d left the stage briefly at the end of the show, then came back out and told the adoring sold-out crowd, “I can’t leave without doing my best song.”

I know, I know, Whitney Houston had a humongous life-altering hit with Dolly’s song. It stayed No. 1 on the pop charts for about three months and perhaps did more than almost anything else to foster country-to-pop and vice versa crossover. But this is, was and always will be Dolly’s song. And she did it so well in Atlanta I felt full as I made the lonely drive back to Albany.

The things I thought about on that drive helped me realize something a few days later after I talked with my sister. She’s the one who was right all along.

Email Carlton Fletcher at [email protected]. Follow @ABH_Fletcher on Twitter.