Reba McEntire still has fond memories of Halloween as a child, even if those memories are also a bit frightening. The 68-year-old recalls celebrating the holiday in rural Oklahoma with her three siblings, memories that she now laughs about, even after all these years.
“The way we used to celebrate it when we were kids – we were out in the country,” McEntire recalls to her record label. “Our nearest neighbor was a couple of miles away from us, so we’d get dressed up and put on lipstick or whatever we could. We didn’t have Halloween costumes, and we’d walk down in the dark to Mr. and Mrs. Winslet’s house, and she’d feed us cookies and milk and then we’d walk back up in the dark.
“But Alice, Susie and I weren’t attentive enough to realize that Pake wasn’t with us in the group, and Pake would get up on the road going to the house and crawl up in a tree and scare the crap out of us,” she adds. “So, that was my Halloween memories right there.”
No word if McEntire and her longtime boyfriend, Rex Linn, will dress up together for Halloween this year. The couple began dating in early 2020, with their romance still going strong — so strong that McEntire says she wouldn’t be opposed to saying “I do” to him someday.
“That would be up to him,” McEntire recently shared on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen. “I’ve been married twice, he’s never been married, so if he wants to, that’s totally up to him.”
“He’s a very supportive man,” she added. “I love him with all my heart,”
McEntire just released the very emotional song and video, “Seven Minutes in Heaven.” The song, from her Not That Fancy acoustic album, and the video are both in tribute to her mother, Jacqueline, who passed away more than three years ago.
“The music video for ‘Seven Minutes In Heaven’ is just really sweet and simple,” McEntire said (via CMT). “We tried to imagine what it might be like to go to heaven and sit down with someone you’ve lost. The heartbreaker is that you only get to spend seven minutes with them.
“For me, that person is my Mama,” she remarked. “I hope that the fans can imagine who that person is for them and find some comfort in knowing that someday, they’ll get to spend forever with that person they love.”
Find all of McEntire’s music and upcoming shows at Reba.com.