Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 1, 1992 TAG: 9203030353
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: E-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
He was the Elvis of late night television; his movies played on the same stations that advertise cures for baldness, 900 numbers and how my life would be better if I studied for a career in gun repair.
Mine was the Elvis who may or may not have appeared in some Kmart in the middle of South Dakota. I was only 10 when he died, and in my formative years, he was making the cover of the National Enquirer, not Rolling Stone.
He was on the cover, too, of ashtrays and cigarette lighters, and I bought them both, although I never smoked. He was available at thrift shops everywhere.
My brother bought three Elvises in black velvet at just such a thrift shop. He hung one above his toilet. We deemed it somehow appropriate.
Growing up in the 1970s, I guess I developed an affinity for the tacky - on road trips, I still stop at South of the Border; in the Midwest, at the World's Largest Ball of Twine.
My musical tastes have always run more toward Elvis Costello than Elvis Presley. I used to cringe when my mother would sing her Jamaica High School alma mater, "Red and Blue," to the tune of "Love me Tender." (She claims that a recent reunion - I won't say what year - everyone in her graduating class remembered all of the words.)
Still, during some awkward years in high school, an Elvis song could bring me solace.
"Did you ever get one of them days, boy, ever get one of them days? When nothing is right, from morning to night, did you ever get one of them days?"
And still, as I scan the channels late at night, my finger pauses on the remote when I hit an Elvis movie, and I lay awake until 2:35, until Elvis gets the girl, until Elvis and the girl drive off into the sunset.
- MADELYN ROSENBERG
by CNB