By Tom Dodge, KERA 90.1 commentator.
Dallas, TX – Ronnie Dawson has been a musical and a nutritional purest all his life. His quest for good health involved the best diet possible, even on the road as a touring musician. He knows his vitamins, herbs, and tonics, like carrot juice cocktails, which he mixes each day. For 40 years, he has kept a disciplined eye on what he eats and how much. On average, he has probably jogged 40 miles a week over the past 40 years. He is very slender for his six-foot frame and hasn't been to a doctor but a time or two in his life. Hospitals are unknown to him.
Now, he is in for the first time and it is for a cancer in his throat.
Maybe it was the thousands of smoke-filled clubs he has played throughout his career. His history as a musician began when he was just a boy. By the time he was 16, he was a regular member of the Light Crust Doughboys. He sang with the Levee Singers until the Levee closed in the 1970s. After that, he and his band The Steel Rail became one of Dallas' premier nightclub acts.
In later years, he toured Europe and the U.S. during the rockabilly revival and made several CDs. He played Carnegie Hall as part of a Texas Blues special and at the Palladium in London as the opening act for Carl Perkins. When George Harrison came backstage and introduced himself, Ronnie said, "Where you playin'? I'll come see you." Ronnie's a great singer and one of the very best rock guitarists.
But he noticed back in early fall that he was having trouble hitting high notes. Then in November, his dentist discovered the growth back in his throat. "I wanted to call and tell you we're having a kind of crisis," he told me in December. He called a few days later and said the biopsy showed the tumor to be malignant.
He hasn't spent any time asking why, or agonizing over his bad luck that it would show up in his throat. When the doctors explained to him that surgery would necessitate the removal of part of his tongue he told them no, that if he couldn't sing he didn't want to live. They said they expected him to say that because they knew who he was. They didn't try to talk him out of it.
But he did consent to intensive chemotherapy and radiation. He called the day before he went into the hospital and laid it out. A stomach tube would help prevent losing weight, of which he has none extra to lose. He would get the tumor-fighting chemicals in his veins twenty-fours a day with time out only for radiation.
He wants his many friends and relatives to give him a few days to see what these first few steps in this long journey will bring before we all try to visit. He has had his "Blond Bomber" hairdo shaved off because he knew radiation's effects on hair and he wanted it to be his idea. He's not happy about this new look but looks at it, as he does everything else, with equanimity. "And if I'm sick," he said, "I'm sure I won't look very good either, so I'd rather wait." This was the showman talking and the bandleader, and you don't argue with the bandleader.
He's coolly logical about it all and realistic. He thinks he will have a few good years left to him to play it his way, a few more good years to hit the high notes, just as before.
Tom Dodge is a writer from Midlothian.