Not every song that defined Merle Haggard’s journey stormed the charts — some lived quietly, carried in the voices beside him. When Merle began performing “That’s the Way Love Goes,” Bonnie Owens often stood nearby, her harmony softening the melancholy edges of the ballad. For audiences, the pairing was seamless: Merle’s weathered baritone telling of life’s turns, Bonnie’s steady voice answering with grace. Bonnie once said, “I always felt my job was to steady him — musically, and in life.” That truth echoed in every performance. “That’s the Way Love Goes” became more than a song; it was the embodiment of their partnership — acknowledging love’s fragility, yet proving that devotion can endure beyond titles. For fans, hearing them together was like eavesdropping on a private vow: honest, unpolished, but lasting.

“Scroll down to the end of the article to listen to music.”

Introduction

Some songs don’t need to shout to make you feel something—they just ease into your soul like an old friend. That’s the Way Love Goes is one of those songs. Originally written by Lefty Frizzell and Sanger D. Shafer, it had been around for decades, even recorded by Johnny Rodriguez in the ’70s. But when Merle Haggard took it on in 1983, he gave it a quiet kind of magic that only he could.

Merle was no stranger to the ups and downs of love and life. His weathered voice carried the weight of experience, and when he sang this song, it wasn’t just a performance—it was a reflection. The lyrics are simple, almost conversational, reminding us that love isn’t always fireworks or grand gestures. Sometimes, it’s just about accepting the way it moves—drifting, shifting, changing—with grace.

The song earned Merle a Grammy for Best Country Vocal Performance, Male, and became one of his late-career triumphs. But more than the awards, what makes it unforgettable is how personal it feels. When you listen, it’s as if Merle is sitting right there, talking to you about love’s unpredictable paths—resigned, but never bitter.

Even today, That’s the Way Love Goes feels timeless, because its message is as true now as it was then: love has its own rhythm, and all we can do is follow where it leads.

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Lyrics

I’ve been throwing horseshoes
Over my left shoulder
I’ve spent most all my life
Searching for that four-leaf clover
Yet you ran with me
Chasing my rainbows
Honey, I love you too
That’s the way love goes
That’s the way love goes, babe
That’s the music God made
For all the world to sing
It’s never old, it grows
Losing makes me sorry
You say, “Honey, now don’t worry
Don’t you know I love you too?”
And that’s the way love goes
That’s the way love goes, babe
That’s the music God made
For all the world to sing
It’s never old, it grows
Losing makes me sorry
And you say, “Honey, don’t worry
Don’t you know I love you too?”
And that’s the way love goes

Country Music

A TEXAS RANGER HEARD A TEENAGER SINGING IN JAIL. THREE YEARS LATER, THAT SAME VOICE WAS SITTING AT NO. 1 ON THE COUNTRY CHART. The song did not start in Nashville. It started behind bars in Texas. Johnny Rodriguez was still a teenager, already carrying more trouble than a young man should have had to carry. His father had died. His older brother had died. Then came the night that put him in jail. He sang to pass the time. Not for a producer. Not for a label. Just a young man in a cell with a voice too strong for the walls around it. Texas Ranger Joaquin Jackson heard him. Word moved to Happy Shahan, the man behind Alamo Village, the western movie set near Brackettville. Johnny was brought there to perform. Then Tom T. Hall and Bobby Bare helped open the next door. By 21, Johnny Rodriguez was signed to Mercury Records. In 1973, “You Always Come Back to Hurting Me” went to No. 1. Then came “Ridin’ My Thumb to Mexico,” “That’s the Way Love Goes,” and a run of hits that made him one of country music’s most important Mexican American voices. He sang in English. Then Spanish would slip into the record like home refusing to stay outside. Country music had always been full of border towns, working men, lonely highways, and men trying to outrun bad luck. Johnny Rodriguez did not need to fake any of that. Before Nashville found him, a Texas jail heard him first.

Country Music

BILLY JOE SHAVER BURIED HIS WIFE, HIS MOTHER, AND HIS SON. THEN HIS HEART GAVE OUT ONSTAGE AT GRUENE HALL — AND THE CROWD DIDN’T EVEN KNOW HE WAS DYING. By 2001, Billy Joe Shaver had already lost more than most country songs could hold. He was not a polished Nashville product. He was the Texas songwriter behind much of Waylon Jennings’ Honky Tonk Heroes, the man who wrote like the road had cut him open and left the truth showing. Then the losses came close together. His wife Brenda died in 1999. His mother died that same year. On December 31, 2000, his son Eddy Shaver — his guitar player, his blood, his shadow onstage — died of a drug overdose at 38. Billy Joe kept moving because stopping probably felt worse. On August 25, 2001, he walked onto the stage at Gruene Hall in New Braunfels, Texas. The room was historic. The crowd was there for songs. They did not come to watch a man collapse under the weight of the last two years. Then his chest started failing him. Billy Joe was having a heart attack while performing. He kept going long enough that the audience apparently did not realize how close the night came to turning into his final show. Afterward came surgery. Then recovery. Then another record. Most singers talk about surviving the road. Billy Joe Shaver survived a song, a stage, and a heart that finally tried to quit in the middle of the set.

Country Music

HIS WIFE DIED THE DAY BEFORE THANKSGIVING. THREE WEEKS LATER, THE KING OF HONKY-TONK WAS FOUND DEAD IN THE SAME FLORIDA HOME. Gary Stewart was never built like a clean Nashville star. He came out of Kentucky poverty, grew up in Florida, and sang country music like the bottle was already open before the band counted off. In the mid-1970s, people called him the King of Honky-Tonk. “She’s Actin’ Single (I’m Drinkin’ Doubles)” went to No. 1 in 1975. But the road under him was never steady. There was the drinking. The drugs. The old back injury. The disappearing years when country music moved on and Gary Stewart kept slipping further from the bright part of the business. Mary Lou was the person who kept showing up beside him. They had been married for more than 40 years. She had seen the bars, the money, the chaos, the fall, the comeback attempts, and the quiet Florida days after the big moment had passed. Then November 26, 2003 came. Mary Lou died of pneumonia, the day before Thanksgiving. Gary canceled his shows. Friends said he was devastated. On December 16, Bill Hardman, his daughter’s boyfriend and Gary’s close friend, went to check on him at his Fort Pierce home. Gary Stewart was dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Fans remember the voice bending around heartbreak like it had nowhere else to go. But the last chapter was not on a stage. It was a widower in Florida, three weeks after losing the woman who had survived the whole honky-tonk storm with him.

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