I only knew Kenny "Dobbo" Dobson as that fit-looking, middle-aged bloke from the Trigg Blue Hole Club.
I photographed the Blue Hole Club's winter swims in 2006, 2007 and 2008 and it didn't take long before I noticed the short, nuggety bloke sporting the compact muscularity of an athlete, who dashed into and out of the cold and roiling surf in no more than a pair of club budgie smugglers between him and the wild, wintry elements.
This was a fella who would laugh at storms and jeer at hurricanes, a bloke for whom the churning ocean and turbid surf meant more a challenge than an impediment.
Two evenings ago, while I drove up into my parents' driveway for our usual Wednesday night dinner, my mobile phone rang. It was Les Lindsay from the club, asking if I remembered Ken Dobson. Of course I did: Dobbo.
I learned from Lindsay that Dobbo had passed away on Sunday after a battle with cancer.
Since then, I have been contacted by members of the club about photographs of Dobbo from the Sunday swims, which they would like to use during Dobbo’s funeral service. From this contact, I gleaned more about Dobbo’s fate.
I last photographed Dobbo at the Blue Hole Club’s windup swim for the 2008 season. It was in September 2008. In that same month, Dobbo was diagnosed with cancer. He underwent treatment and all seemed to go well – he was in remission.
The cancer, however, did not relinquish its hold on Dobbo, later insinuating itself into his head. He went into hospital for surgery to his head, where surgeons drilled into his skull to treat the cancer.
Dobbo did not recover. Things went wrong after surgery and a week later, in the hospital, he passed from this world.
His funeral is tomorrow, at Karrakatta, followed by a service at Trigg Surf Life Saving Club for family, friends and fellow-clubbies.
In looking through the archives of Blue Hole Club photographs, searching for images which had Dobbo in them for the funeral, I became aware that the photographs gave the impression that, in their timeless, frozen eternity, Dobbo was still around, still with us, and that, on Sunday, he would still be down at Trigg Beach raring to race into the ocean.
Dobbo’s mate, Boots Campbell, dropped into the office to collect the CD of images yesterday. He told me that Dobbo was one of his best mates – they went on trips together, competed in triathlons and surf events; Boots seemed crestfallen, shaken, confused by the suddenness of his mate’s departure, the irony of a man at the peak of physical fitness being denied life and future by that terrible C.
In the time I photographed the Blue Hole Club, I rarely spoke to Dobbo – perhaps a nod here, a quick “how’re you going” there. But in photographing Dobbo and in looking at the photographs, I came to know him in the odd, inexplicable way that you can come to know someone because, in photographing them, they become a part of your consciousness, a part of your history.
Be at peace, Dobbo. You’re swimming with good company now.
