It was 47 years ago today that Elvis died. He was 42 years old. I was 19 and didn't realize how young 42 is. I also didn't really think much about Elvis at the time. I remember watching his movies on television when I was a kid and thinking how really bad they were. I wasn't an Elvis fan. But his death did cause a ripple in my universe.
I was working at the public library in the town where I grew up at the time. And my boss was an annoying and not overly bright person named Dalene. She wasn't really a librarian. I worked in Circulation and in the hierarchy that exists in libraries that is the equivalent to the Infantry in the army. The elite people were the reference librarians. Circulation people were basically clerks. When I started at the library, I was 16. It was my first job. And I was hired to shelf books 15 or so hours a week. Later I rose to the status of Circulation Clerk and checked out (and in) books. It was a shit job.
But Dalene had worked at the library most of her adult life and had risen to the rank of Head Circulation Librarian. She got the job after the Head Circulation Librarian before her retired and on the condition that she get her library degree. So she was going going to college during the night and working during the day.
As I said before, Dalene was about as sharp as a river rock. She was in her 30s and still lived with her mother and sister. And Dalene loved Elvis. She loved him so much that she became despondent when news that he died on his toilet in Graceland on August 16, 1977 hit the air waves. And she had to go home.
I thought that was weird (to coin a phrase we now reserve for Trump and his supporters). I thought it was even weirder when Dalene asked me to house sit at her house when she, her mother and sister went on vacation and I was introduced to the Elvis shrine in her bedroom complete with candles and photos. It left such an impression on me that years later when the Internet was new and I was looking for inspiration for a Web presence and a hook for a plot for the novel I was attempting to write at the time I remembered Dalene and her obsession with the King of Rock and Roll.
So I developed my first Web site called Disgraceland and filled it with information about Elvis and the people who were obsessed with Elvis. And I tried writing a novel called "Jukebox of the Gods" about Elvis, Quantum Physics and an Exotic Dancer who got caught up in a plethora of Elvis sightings triggered by a young man selecting the song "Don't Be Cruel" by Elvis on a jukebox at a dive bar at the same time his doppleganger in an alternative universe played the same song on an alternate jukebox causing their worlds to collide and bring Elvis with it.
I've written about writing it several times in my blog, I just never finished it. And what I did write got lost somewhere on a floppy disk (just to show you how long ago it was). And "Jukebox of the Gods" never got to play its tune and make me a famous novelist. Though something tells me it would have been as popular as my blog is today if I'd written it.
Still, Elvis' death has woven its way through my life now for years. And although I wasn't a fan when he was alive, I became an Elvis scholar and collector years later. I've been to Graceland twice and I still have a fair amount of Elvis memorabilia and every year at Christmas I put up a white artificial tree and decorate it with umpteen Elvis themed ornaments.
It's not weird. It's odd, but I've accepted that Elvis and I were destined to be intertwined regardless of whether I am a fan or not. And honestly I am not truly a fan in the true sense of the word, but I do appreciate the phenomenon that he was and is.
That being said, today is the anniversary of his death. It is also National Tell a Joke Day and National Roller Coaster Day.
How do those things relate to Elvis. Elvis liked jokes (just not at his expense) and he loved amusement park rides and would rent out entire amusement parks and ride the rides all night for his amusement. So kind of like Kevin Bacon, everything ties back to Elvis.
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