Reba: Cleaning Closets ‘Brings Me Pleasure’

Reba McEntire is as busy right now as she's ever been, as she just released a new lifestyle book full of advice, recipes, stories, and photos from her life growing up. She also released an acoustic album dubbed Not That Fancy. And she is also front and center as a coach this season on NBC's The Voice.

We talked to Reba today (10/27) about everything she has going on and asked if she ever slows down. Reba admitted, "It's hard, and Rex (Linn, her boyfriend) really brings that up to me a lot. He says, 'The hardest thing for you to do is be still and be present in the moment.' I have worked on that for years to not plan, scheme, or think about tomorrow. Tomorrow is tomorrow, and yesterday was yesterday; you can't fix either one of them, and I'm just waiting on God to tell me my next move and what I'll be doing."

She continued, "In the meantime, I enjoy life. I love to purge a house. I love to clean out a closet in a heartbeat because that's what brings me pleasure. I love getting to hang out with friends and family, go see a movie, have dinner, have people over, and play games. It's very seldom that I just sit and not do anything."

Reba concluded that it runs in her family. She offered, "Suzy's (her sister) is the same way. Well, we're all four kids the same way. We like to stay busy or active and, so I guess that's my next project is really trying to be still in the moment. That's just the way we're built, I guess."

Reba recently released a new song and video for the Not That Fancy album that accompanies the new book. The song is called "Seven Minutes In Heaven," and it is a moving tribute to Reba's mother, Jacqueline, who died at 93 in March of 2020.

The lyrics to the new song include, "If I had seven minutes in Heaven / I know just what I'd do / Take a walk down those golden streets / And find a quiet corner booth / I wouldn't spend all my seconds asking God questions / 'Cause He knows I'd be back soon / If I had seven minutes in Heaven / I'd spend them all with you."

Reba McEntire's songs have been the backbone of country music since the early 1980s. Reba has scored more than 20 number-one hits in her storied career and is considered one of the Queens of Country Music, alongside other Queens like Dolly Parton and Loretta Lynn.

In 2024, Reba has outdone herself and now appears on national TV weekly as a coach for NBC's The Voice. In early February of this year (2024), she sang the National Anthem at the Super Bowl flawlessly and gracefully. She showed everyone in the world that she still has it as she approaches her 70s, celebrating her 69th birthday today (3/28).

She recently chatted with CMT and shared one of her most embarrassing moments on stage with them. CMT posted the fun interview clip on their Instagram.

In the clip, Reba is asked what her most embarrassing moment was. She quipped, "Oh gosh, how much time do you have?" The country icon recalled, "It was the early '80s, and I was headlining. I was going to make my way to stage right, and blue lights were gonna come on."

She continued, "I was gonna walk back on stage and sing 'Sweet Dreams' acapella. I did not remember this monitor being there on the floor, so when I was shuffling my way off stage right, I shuffled my toes right underneath that monitor and fell over on top of it."

She continued, "I crawled off stage and ripped my britches, but the show must go on so I dusted myself off and put my hand over where I ripped my britches. I came back out and did the song, and nobody knew the difference."

I have interviewed and spent a lot of time with Reba during my career as a country music journalist. Since the 1990s, I have discovered that Reba is a positive and very nice person. When you are around her, you forget she is a music icon because of how genuine and really down-to-earth she is.

In one of my most recent interviews with Reba, I told her about this list and asked what her top five Reba songs were; her response as she used her fingers to count, "' Fancy,' 'Is There Life Out There,' 'I'm A Survivor,' 'Can't Even Get The Blues,' 'Take It Back,' and 'Why Haven't I Heard From You,' that's six and 'Georgia,' ('The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia') 'Georgia' has to be in there too, that's seven."

And yes, "Fancy" would be her number-one song. She offered, "I just love story songs."

To celebrate her 69th birthday today (3/28), we dove deep into Reba's catalog to rate what we think are her 40 best songs.