Jun 12, 2014

  • Marty SmithESPN

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    • ESPN NASCAR atomic number 82 reporter
    • Former NASCAR.com senior writer
    • xv years covering NASCAR

This wasn't supposed to be a piece about a male parent's influence. It just turned out that style. The goal was to interview ii of my heroes, Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn, about a third hero, Dale Earnhardt.

The land music superstars enjoyed the rare blessing of spending extensive fourth dimension with Earnhardt, one of the more mysterious icons of a generation. Large East was hard to get to and even harder to become to know. But they were friends. True friends. So they saw depth and vulnerability The Human being In Black didn't often reveal.

Their stories are rich and rare, a tangible portal toward an untouchable field of study, and they made me retrieve about my father's mark on my life's approach and direction. My male parent is in everything I practice. He is in every mistake I make and every triumph I achieve.

I see him every day when I expect at my children. And every day that passes, he was a picayune chip more right.

Dunn inadvertently reminded of that with a story that proved to exist a verbal haymaker.

Nosotros were discussing the "Honky Tonk Truth" video, which he and Brooks shot at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and featured a cameo past Earnhardt. They were positioned in front of the casino'south main sign, out front on a hoist, high above the basis.

And they were winging it. At that place was no script. Brooks and Dunn felt desperately about asking Earnhardt to participate in the first place, and by now they'd kept him at that place longer than was originally planned. During a lull in the activity, while director Sherman Halsey and his crew worked through some gear up changes, Dunn turned to Earnhardt and mentioned his father.

Dunn said it struck a nerve.

"He and I were upwards on this hoist, and I forget what it was, something like, 'What would our dads think of us standing upward here in the middle of nowhere doing this crazy stuff?' " Dunn said. "And he spun around and said, 'What the hell?!'

"His reaction gave me a little insight into how driven he was -- and why -- and about what his dad had achieved, and him as a kid and how big that was to him.

"I felt the same fashion most my dad. He really wanted to be a country vocaliser. He did his deal at a certain level, but never broke into the big time. That's interesting psychologically, how that goes on to motivate and bulldoze us along the fashion -- forever. We talked about that -- I talked near my dad and he told me almost his. Information technology was a common bond. It fabricated him what he was."

Brooks explained that the thought for the "Honky Tonk Truth" video was built-in past take a chance at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Brooks and Dunn were walking across the Brickyard garage toward Earnhardt's No. iii transporter to meet their buddy when they heard longing whispers behind them.

"Ronnie and I had gone to the track to watch him drive the night before we shot it, I recall at Indy, and some girls were walking behind us going over to his trailer," Brooks said. "And I could hear one of them from backside united states of america going, 'That's him, isn't it!' And of course, my arrogance assumes they're talking about me, and then I puff up. And I look over my shoulder and i of them goes, 'Aw man. That's not Earnhardt!' I'm like, 'Well, due south---!' "

When they arrived (defeated) at the transporter, they told Earnhardt the story. Then they hatched a concept for the video. Like Earnhardt, Brooks had a famous mustache. Wearing cowboy hats, they looked quite similar. He likewise noted that he carried two exact items of everything he wore. Earnhardt would dress exactly like Brooks and strum a guitar, lip sync a little bit. They'd take quick shots of both and the audition wouldn't be able to distinguish between them until later on in the video, when the shots got longer.

"He goes, 'I own't doin' that! I can't sing! I can't act! I'll wind upwardly looking similar an idiot!'" Brooks laughed. "And I go, 'I swear, if you don't like this video, you have my word, I'll cut out every part with y'all in there! Regardless, come out and accept some fun and a couple of drinks, and you can come across how the video'southward made. I swear this will be fun, Dale.'

"Then he came out there and we went to dinner and had a few drinks, and he loosened upwards and quit worrying most information technology. And we got up on peak of the Rio, where well-nigh of it was shot, and just hung out all night and laughed and had a great fourth dimension. That video is one of the well-nigh fun ones we ever did."

Earnhardt loved it.

"When I sent it to him I was on pins and needles, considering I actually wanted him to like it," Brooks said. "He called me upwards immediately and goes, 'This is and then frickin' good. I love this!' I was so relieved! As far as the night nosotros were doing it, we were simply cocktailing and having a good time. Both of us off the clock."

That was the rare moment when Earnhardt played a role. In real life, what he played is who he was. He was honest-to-God intimidating. Both men agreed wholeheartedly to that.

"He was intense. So intense," Dunn said. "The way he goes about things, and his demeanor. His aura is that way. He but didn't take any tolerance for bulls---, unless he was out with the boys handing it out and dealing it."

Brooks: "There was nothing subtle about anything he did. He certainly had a very sincere and very serious side to him, but when we were out in the open up, it was e'er just wide-open up. He lived his life just the way he lived on the racetrack. He was very intimidating. He was dangerous. And there was really no one I enjoyed spending time with more than him."

Dunn told tales of fishing expeditions during which business suits tagged along. Big E didn't similar that so much. On one such outing, he defenseless a monster bass, removed it from the claw and flung it directly at an unwelcome business-type.

"It was like, 'Here, throw that in the ice breast, man,' " Dunn howled.

Then there was the fourth dimension they were fishing in the Bahamas, Dunn connected, howling all the same, that Brooks snagged a rare white marlin. Earnhardt was overjoyed, grabbed Brooks by the shoulders and started hollering about how amazing the accomplishment was. ("Do you know what you just did?! That'southward so rare, homo!") Then he shoved Brooks in the ocean.

"So here he is in the middle of the f---ing Bahama islands, shark-infested waters, [thinking] I'g gonna dice!' " Dunn continued. "And sure enough, Dale turned around and came back and got him. But it scared the hell out of him! That's just [Dale'southward] natural personality, and the makeup of what he was. He was crazy!"

He shared a tale from Richard Childress about a horse-riding outing in Wyoming, side by side to some steep cliffs, when Earnhardt ran up and slapped Childress' horse equally difficult equally he could. Childress nearly went over the ledge.

"Dale idea stuff like that was funny," Dunn laughed. "You had to keep your distance and be absurd, and be very aware that he was around you lot, that he was even in your goose egg code."

Brooks: "He was a super fun guy, just Type A to the max. When I'd get visit him at the rails, I'd always be looking over my shoulder, because his way of saying hi is to knock you to the ground like a fullback and give you a noogie similar a 3rd-grader."

Despite The Intimidator persona, Earnhardt was a very caring person. For years, at least once a week, Brooks chatted past phone with Earnhardt. The conversations were typical of run-and-gun famous fathers who lived in the revolving door that spins between the restlessness of fame and refuge of family unit.

That door is drinking glass: From i side of life you tin can ever peer through and run into the other. And it never stops spinning.

Theirs were unlike lives but the same, ane a country music superstar and the other a transcendent icon in car racing. So to have an understanding ear was wonderful. Both were the lowest, entrenched in here-today-gone-tomorrow whirlwinds; another stage in some other town, pushed, pulled, tugged, scheduled. Glamorous but taxing. With information technology came much expectation.

During i particular Wednesday morning time chat, Earnhardt wasn't attentive. He was preoccupied. Brooks noticed readily and told his friend they could chat another time.

"He was upset," Brooks recalled. "I could tell he wasn't half paying attention. And then I get, 'Hey, human being, you busy or something? If yous gotta go, go.' He said, 'Naw, I gotta tell you. I don't allow anybody e'er sign my name. Always. That's a fightin' deal right there for me.' "

"

He said, 'If I'd have called on Mon, I'd have been able to talk to that kid.' I said, 'Man you merely gotta permit that go.' But he said, 'Right now, I just experience -- information technology'south not selfish, I don't know what information technology is, but I really feel like I screwed something upwards existent bad.'

" -- Kix Brooks on Dale Earnhardt'south feelings nigh missing an opportunity to attain out to a fan who had died

Earnhardt wanted every autograph to be authentic. Information technology was a slice of him that his fans deserved to know was real. As a result, Brooks explained, Earnhardt kept a schedule. Mon was postal service solar day. He would come up into the office, where two stacks of post sat on his desk. Ane pile was standard fan postal service. The other stack independent items that required greater attending and more urgency.

On that particular Monday, Brooks continued, Earnhardt had an engagement he wanted to attend, and did. Brooks said perchance it was a fishing trip. The mail on his desk sabbatum for two extra days.

" 'And so I got in this morn,' " Brooks said Earnhardt told him during that Midweek chat, " 'and looked at my pile, and there was a note on at that place from a kid at a hospital, and he was a big fan of mine. And he was like a Make-A-Wish kid, and he wanted to talk to me, was his wish. And so I chosen him up, and the kid passed away yesterday.'

"He said, 'If I'd have called on Monday, I'd accept been able to talk to that kid.' I said, 'Human being yous just gotta let that get.' Simply he said, 'Right at present, I just experience -- information technology's non selfish, I don't know what it is, but I really feel like I screwed something up existent bad.' "

The friends discussed the situation for some time afterward.

It was a rare peek for Brooks into his friend'due south soul.

"I'thou barely famous compared to what he was, and all the demands on your time and everything else are hard, but those were existent things in his life that he really cared nigh," Brooks said.

"He was difficult-ass and a wild-ass, but he had a heart as big as N Carolina. Things that mattered, mattered to him. He couldn't practice it all. Every now and so I'd catch him on a day like that and I'd realize what a soft center he had."

Another example of that was the No. 1 Brooks & Dunn boom "Y'all're Gonna Miss Me." Brooks, Dunn and Don Cook wrote the song, and Earnhardt embraced it similar none other.

"That meant a lot," Brooks said. "It's funny that that vocal, him and Ty Murray, equally much fun as we had together, two hardcore badasses that I really respect, both loved that vocal.

"And it kind of shows you lot a lot, from a rodeo cowboy to a race machine driver, both of them, you just consider being completely hard-ass competitors, they both came to me equally friends with a soft side, for lack of a ameliorate way of putting it, and sincerely told me how much they loved that song.

"It'south sort of a testament to the man condition that all of us hate to let people know that nosotros've got a soft side when nosotros're grown men. We desire to exist badasses. Those are the things in your life -- especially like a vocal you create -- that allows you to sort of intermission through the bulls--- and find a friendship that'south a piddling deeper than simply striking each other in the arm."

I wondered aloud what information technology must be like for your words to affair so securely and so personally to someone then transcendent. Dunn paused for a long while when asked. He told me, as a child growing up in Oklahoma and Texas, NASCAR was never his thing. He had no interest in investing the time to sit and lookout man. And so he saw Earnhardt race live at Charlotte Motor Speedway. It changed everything.

"I saw him come up from 2 laps down with 38 laps to get to win the race. I was blown away by what I saw," he said. "Information technology made me respect so much what he did.

"I retrieve him calling us back to the back of the trailer. I was e'er very self-conscious about not getting up into his space. He'd go dorsum to the back of the trailer and take a nap. That was a big tradition for him.

"And I never wanted to impose on him. He'd cadet upwards, shoot the breeze, and I'd always grab myself going, 'What the hell am I doing back here?' I don't know what connectedness in that location was there. But in that location was an unspoken thing that drew united states together."

Earnhardt's death affected Brooks and Dunn differently. They both remember the solar day vividly.

They were in Atlantic City, New Bailiwick of jersey, to play a show at the Trump Taj Mahal. Both watched the Daytona 500 in their respective hotel rooms. Both saw the crash. Both said they received split up telephone calls from the racetrack with the news that their friend had died.

"It dropped me to my knees," Dunn said. "I got a telephone call, after seeing [the wreck], perhaps 15 minutes afterwards from a friend who was close to Dale. He said, 'Dale's gone.' I hung up the phone, knocked on Kix's door. I told him I just got a call. Dale didn't brand it."

He paused.

"It's so difficult to talk nearly, even today," he continued. "In some ways, information technology doesn't make sense. I don't know. In that location's something weird near how ... I don't know ... about him. If it was someone else, it probably wouldn't have affected me that way. I call back the funeral, seeing people come in from all over the world, sports figures from everywhere.

"Information technology dawned on me the outreach he had, and the bear on on people's lives he had. And more than just being a racecar commuter. He'due south just a really strong personality. Johnny Cash was that fashion. One time you've been in a room with him a couple of times ... they're so rare."

Brooks said he has a governor for that emotion. He lost his mother when he was iv years old. His grandmother came to help raise him, and she died when he was 7. That built an emotional filter within him that allows those feelings to seep in from time to time.

"I'thou still getting over it," Brooks said. "And at the same time, I was able to cope with it, kind of that same twenty-four hours. I'll never forget it. I was at the Taj Mahal, and we were fixing to play in Atlantic City, and I was watching the race and that wreck hit.

"I remember [Michael] Waltrip going, 'I'm notwithstanding worried about Dale.' They were all jubilant the win. About that time, somebody called from the pits and said, 'Homo, Dale's dead.' I said, 'What?' He said, 'I gotta go now. I just wanted to allow you know.' I just sabbatum there going, 'Holy due south---.' And then all this stuff broke loose."

Brooks said he and Dunn decided they would press on with the scheduled testify and try to cake out the news. When they walked onstage that hope became immediately incommunicable.

"I walked out on phase that dark, and the first thing I saw staring me right in the face, in the front end row, there's this guy with tats all over him and a Dale Earnhardt No. 3 T-shirt, centre phase, right up front, with big ol' damn crocodile tears rolling downwardly his cheeks," Brooks said. "I'grand thinking, 'S---, he knows.' So I sentry this guy all night. It was very surreal.

"I couldn't think almost anything else. Words were coming out of my oral cavity but it totally dominated. And and then from at that place, it was merely ... on, all the stuff that comes with losing a friend, without getting to say goodbye."

Both men take smashing solace in the bully memories. They abdomen laugh now at the stories. They could non possibly have enjoyed 1 another'southward company more. And they're still learning.

"I'chiliad damn nearly 60 years old, I got to Nashville 30 years agone!" Brooks said. "It seems similar yesterday. Ronnie and mine's career flew by in the blink of an eye. It seems then cliché, only if you become to feel that kind of friendship, whether information technology's your girlfriend or wife, if y'all go to experience that kind of honey ... I'm merely learning not to live with regret.

"I'm learning to appreciate the blessings. Because regrets aren't something y'all want to spend any time on."

Following a vacation trip to Africa, Dunn said he woke upward jet-lagged one morning recently and flipped on the idiot box. In that location was a program on virtually important moments in NASCAR history. One of them was Earnhardt's fatal crash.

"To this day, I catch myself vehement up when they showed the wreck and talked about it," he said. "In that location'southward a profound impact in that location for me. I don't do that [reaction]. I don't understand why I did."

Dunn paused over again to collect himself, not certain what exactly to say. During that moment I said to him what I say most every time I talk over Earnhardt:

"Superman's non supposed to die."

"That'due south information technology, buddy," he said. "That'south exactly information technology."