By Tom Dodge, KERA 90.1 commentator
Dallas, TX – Ronnie Dawson is a kind of patriarch of Rockabilly music now. As a teenager with the Light Crust Doughboys, he began making this hot music on his own that may have preceded Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and even Elvis. But he didn't get big outside of Dallas until the 1980's, when some of these songs were re-recorded by "The Cramps," a hot British band. They called him a Rockabilly pioneer.
Now, at 63, he's a pioneer again. He's in an experimental cancer program at Baylor Hospital in Dallas. He feels he may pick up a few extra years and do some good for others in the process. Doctors inject his tumors with an experimental vaccine that has shrunk them in test cases and even made them disappear. He's taking chemotherapy along with it because the tests showed that it makes them stay gone longer
He's philosophical about it all, doesn't complain or indulge in the old "why me?" game. He has pretty much turned his fate over to the doctors and lets his wife Christi make sure everything on the program goes along on schedule. He also allows his old friends to be included so they don't feel quite so helpless. I took him for his second day of treatment and stayed with him until Christi came home from work. Paul Vinton, a band member, took him the day before. All his friends will have a chance to drive him.
Afterwards, we checked on star-man Lyndon Dodge, who's at Baylor recuperating from pilonidal cyst surgery. After 20 years of sitting in a wheelchair, the cyst had developed into an open, painful, wound. Just the week before, they had toiled all day in Ronnie's workshop to finish the telescope they had been working on for months. Neither of them felt like doing it, but because of life's continuing surprises for them, they were obsessive about getting it finished. Ronnie's legendary energy is in shorter supply now and every bit of it is precious to him. Lyndon's wheelchair was doing a number on his wound. I knew this from years of seeing his cold sweats and shakes that come with the pain. He felt that if Ronnie could do it, he could too. So, they pushed on.
Ronnie had crafted the barrel out of white pine and the mounting out of redwood. Lyndon meticulously installed the mirrors and the eyepieces. It was a work of art.
While they were taking a break, Syd and Billy King came by. They're singing barbers from Carrollton. They specialize in Western Swing and have made some records. A little while later, Mike O'Daniels, a great guitar-man from Waxahachie, came in. We sat in the shade of Ronnie's workshop and had a hoedown. Lyndon played some mandolin tunes and we all sang "Blue Moon of Kentucky." The brothers King cut down on some Bob Wills numbers and Ronnie sang "I Love You Because," one that he said had rolling around in his head all day. Mike sang a jazzy version of the old Lefty Frizzell classic, "That's the Way Love Goes."
For a while there was no thought of cancer or spinal injury or surgery, only harmony.
Lyndon was lying on his back in a high-tech bed that makes him all but weightless. He told Ronnie about the thrill of looking through the telescope the night before his surgery. He calls it "first light."
They talked about their plans to take it to the mountains of Fort Davis when they get well and check out Jupiter's neighborhood.
That's the way love goes.
Tom Dodge is a writer from Midlothian.