In 2006, Bonnie Owens was several years into Alzheimer’s when she took Merle Haggard by the arm and led him to her room to show him a large photograph of the two of them. The song behind that moment is “Today I Started Loving You Again”, the ballad Merle wrote with and for Bonnie in the late 1960s. It began as a passing remark in an airport, was finished on a paper hamburger bag in a Dallas motel, and went on to become the most covered song of his career.
Two Bakersfield Singers, One Road
When Merle and Bonnie met in California in 1961, she was the established act and he was the newcomer. Bonnie had already been married to Buck Owens and had her own country hits. In 1964, manager Fuzzy Owen suggested the two record a duet, and “Just Between the Two of Us” became the best-known recording of Bonnie’s career.
In 1965, the Academy of Country Music named Bonnie its Female Vocalist of the Year, and that same year she married Merle. From then on she toured with his band, The Strangers, as a harmony singer and devoted much of her time to his career and his children.
She also became something like his songwriting secretary. Merle later recalled that whenever he hinted he was about to write, she was there with a pad and pen. He credited her with taking down songs such as “Mama Tried” and “Workin’ Man Blues.”
A Week Off After 90 Days in Texas
Life with The Strangers meant long stretches away from home. As Merle told it, he and Bonnie had been on a Texas tour of about 90 days when they finally got a week off before another 45 days of shows. They flew home to Los Angeles, and he remarked that they had barely had time to say hello to each other.
Walking through an airport, Merle looked at Bonnie and told her he thought he had started loving her again that day. Bonnie heard a song in it and told him to turn the phrase around and put “today” at the front. Merle’s reply, as he later told it:
“That gives you half of it.” — Merle Haggard
The Night He Wrote It on a Hamburger Bag
A few days later, the tour picked up again in Texas. In a Dallas motel room, Merle asked Bonnie to go out and get him a hamburger. While she was gone, he wrote the song in a single sitting, and the paper bag from his dinner became his first draft.
Merle later said he gave Bonnie half of his own share of the song’s royalties, and that she received the rest after they divorced.
A B-Side That Outlived the Hit
Merle and The Strangers recorded the song at Capitol’s Hollywood studio on February 1, 1968. Capitol released it as the B-side of “The Legend of Bonnie and Clyde,” another Haggard–Owens co-write. The A-side reached No. 1 on Billboard’s country chart in April 1968 and stayed there for two weeks.
The ballad on the flip side never charted for Merle. It also appeared on the 1968 album The Legend of Bonnie & Clyde, which reached No. 6 on the country albums chart. Over time it became a staple of classic country radio and a song that other singers kept returning to.
One of the Most Covered Songs in Country Music
Other artists picked the song up almost immediately. Waylon Jennings, Conway Twitty and Marty Robbins recorded it in 1968. Al Martino took it to No. 86 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1969. In 1975 Sammi Smith reached No. 9 on the country chart with it, and soul singer Bettye Swann’s version reached No. 46 on the Hot 100 and No. 26 on the R&B chart. Bobby Bland and Emmylou Harris recorded it later.
Critics still single it out. AllMusic’s Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote that it overshadowed the other songs Merle chose to record for that album.
After the Divorce: Still Singing Harmony
Merle and Bonnie separated in 1975 and divorced in 1978. Their story did not end there. On October 7, 1978, Merle married singer Leona Williams at a ranch in Nevada, and Bonnie was one of the bridesmaids.
In the late 1970s Bonnie went back on the road with The Strangers and kept touring with Merle for years, even after she remarried. Fans sometimes saw a remarkable sight: the man who wrote the song, with his former wife and co-writer singing harmony behind him.
“He’s My Favorite”
Bonnie’s memory began to fail in the early 2000s, and she entered hospice care in 2006. Merle went to see her that year. At a Country Music Hall of Fame event in 2012, he described the visit, and he became emotional as he told it.
Bonnie took his arm and said she needed to show him her room. Behind her bed hung a large photograph of the two of them, taken when they were much younger. She looked at him and said something he never forgot:
“He’s my favorite.” — Bonnie Owens
She did not connect the man in the picture with the man standing beside her. Bonnie Owens died on April 24, 2006, in Bakersfield, at 76. Merle died ten years later, on his 79th birthday, April 6, 2016.
Why the Song Still Matters
Plenty of songs are written about falling in love for the first time. This one is about something harder to catch: noticing, in the middle of a tired and busy life, that the feeling has come back. It was born from a real marriage on a real tour, in an airport and a cheap motel room.
Its history adds a bittersweet layer. The woman who helped name the song kept singing beside the man who wrote it long after their marriage ended. Decades later, she still called him her favorite, even when she could no longer say who he was.
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FAQ
Who did Merle Haggard write “Today I Started Loving You Again” about?
He wrote it about his second wife, singer Bonnie Owens, after a long Texas tour gave them a rare week together. She is credited as co-writer.
Where was “Today I Started Loving You Again” written?
Merle wrote it in a Dallas motel room, on the paper bag from a hamburger Bonnie had gone out to buy him.
Was “Today I Started Loving You Again” a hit for Merle Haggard?
Not on the charts. It was released in 1968 as the B-side of “The Legend of Bonnie and Clyde,” which went to No. 1. Even so, it became one of his best-known and most covered songs.
Who else recorded “Today I Started Loving You Again”?
Among many others: Waylon Jennings, Conway Twitty, Marty Robbins, Al Martino, Sammi Smith (a No. 9 country hit in 1975), Bettye Swann, Bobby Bland and Emmylou Harris.
Sources
- American Songwriter – “Without this woman, Merle Haggard might have never released hits like ‘Mama Tried’ and ‘Working Man Blues'”
- Whiskey Riff – “Merle Haggard’s Story About The Last Time He Visited His Ex-Wife Before She Passed Away” (2024)
- Wide Open Country – “Bonnie Owens Fine-Tuned Merle Haggard’s Quintessential Sound”
- Rolling Stone – “Merle Haggard Takes ‘Bonnie and Clyde’ to Number One” (2018)
- David Cantwell, Merle Haggard: The Running Kind (University of Texas Press, 2013)
- Wikipedia – “Today I Started Loving You Again”, “The Legend of Bonnie and Clyde (song)”, “The Legend of Bonnie & Clyde”, “Bonnie Owens”
- RolandNote – Leona Williams timeline (wedding date, October 7, 1978)