Twentieth Century Drifter: The Life of Marty Robbins

[14] “I Want To Race Again”

[14] “I Want To Race Again” On January 2, 1970, Marty went into the Columbia studio and recorded “My Woman, My Woman, My Wife” as the title track of his next album. Although he often said he wrote the song for Marizona while in the hospital, he probably fine-tuneditthere.RalphEmeryaskedhim,“Wherewereyouwhenyouwrote this song?” He answered, “In a bus.” Okie Jones says Marty wrote it before the Las Vegas trip in July. Marty said his hospital stay showed him “what a woman has to go through in life, and I dedicate that to all of the ladies in the world because they do go through a lot. They say man works from sun to sun but a woman’s work is never done. A woman has it hard in this world.”1 124 “I was really quite honored,” Marizona said years later, during the seventyfifth birthday tribute for her deceased husband. “I appreciated it, and naturally I cried. He said he’d wanted to write a song for me for a long time. He jokingly said the reason he wrote it was because I didn’t make him eat hospital food; I would take him fried chicken.” She quickly explained she did take food to him but “it probably wasn’t fried chicken, because he wasn’t supposed to be eating fried chicken.”2 Marty also recorded “A Very Special Way,” a song he wrote to thank his fans. Because he couldn’t possibly answer personally the volumes of mail he’d received in the hospital, he sang, “And thanks again for helping when I needed you. Oh, it seems so little, what else can I say, I love you in a very special way.” On a session two weeks later, he finished the first half of the album. He also completed a photo shoot for the album cover. Looking back later, he said, “I look at those pictures and I think, hey, I don’t look too healthy.”3 He wanted to compete in NASCAR again, but first he needed medical clearance.Dr.WilliamEwers,Marty’sinternist,wantedtowaituntilMaytogive him a coronary arteriogram, but Marty convinced him to do it earlier. Marty checked into St. Thomas Hospital in Nashville on January 20 for diagnostic tests. The heart-muscle arteriogram was a newly devised process that injected aspecialsubstance into the heart’s three main arteries to colorthem forX-rays. Marty’sX-raysshowedsignificantcholesterolcongestion.4 Theresultsshocked him. “It showedthat of the threeleading arteries, two of them were100percent blocked and the other was 80 percent blocked,” he remembered. “It was so bad it scared the doctor when he saw it.” Marty’s blood-thinner medication was keeping him alive. Wanting to have some time to think about surgery, Marty asked how long he had to live. “If it was me or my wife or my children, I’d say do it today,” Dr. Ewers replied. He couldn’t promise how much longer Marty would live even with surgery—or if he would get off the operating table. That scared forty-four-year-old Marty. “I’ve always been pretty religious, as far as believing,” he said later. “I don’t do all the things I should do—I never have. But that night I prayed and prayed. Finally, I realized living was not the most important thing; it wasn’t life that mattered. So I prayed that regardless of what happened, my soul would be saved, and in the morning when I woke up I would have the answer. Well, the next morning, everything was peaceful. 125 [ CH 14 ] “I Want To Race Again” I had the answer. I told the doctor I wanted to have the operation as soon as I could. And I never worried after that.”5 He and Marizona contacted the American Red Cross for assistance in getting Ronny home.6 The Red Cross notified the U.S. Army, and Ronny was granted emergency leave to fly home from his duty station in Germany. Marty gave an interview on January 23 while lying in his hospital bed. To avoidanyappearance of askingforsympathy, he allowedno photographs. “I’ve got a 1969 Dodge Dart ready and I want to race it,” he said. “I didn’t want to start racing again untilItookthese tests andfoundout everything was allright, so I came and took them and found out nothing was all right.” Because of his excellentphysicalcondition,hecouldn’tanswerthequestionastowhatcaused his heart attack. “I don’t...