It was the late 1970s and I was dabbling with wearing a
scarf on my head like Rhoda Morgenstern.
I was into Dust in the Wind and Slip Slidin’ Away, but my older sister,
my aunts and my mom were all caught up in the great Elvis impersonator craze of
1978. Try as they might they couldn’t bring Elvis back, but they sure had a
great time trying.
We lived outside of St. Louis, which is - and I don’t know
if you are aware of this – home to one
of the best Elvis impersonators of all time. He played at area dinner theatres
and theme parks and I’m pretty sure he still does, which is an obvious
testament to his skill. The female members of my family ate this up like gooey butter
cake on Easter Sunday.
I went along one night when he played at a dinner theatre
near where we lived. I should have been the designated driver because I was of
driving age and too young to drink, but this was long before we worried about
such things. As I remember it, I went along for the dinner part of the dinner
theatre.
The grownups were having a blast. I’m pretty sure Tom
Collins and the Whiskey Sours were the warm-up act. None of them were feeling
any pain by the time “Elvis” took the stage.
He was a consummate performer and managed to nail all of
Elvis’s moves, including the sexy way he pulled his scarf off and tossed it to
his adoring fans. The ladies in our
group determined after the first scarf came off that by God, they were going to
get one. My sister was especially anxious to get one. She took Elvis’s death
particularly hard. My Aunt Cookie - never one to back down from a challenge -
said to my sister, “Come on, Carol. I’ll go down there with you.” And off they
went.
Well, once they got down there Aunt Cookie had a change of
heart and they returned to the table unable to score. Now, my mom, Doris, was
the older of the two sisters and she and my Aunt Cookie could have gone by the
name “Double Trouble” (Elvis film, 1967).
“Don’t worry, Carol,” our dutiful mother said, pulling my Aunt
Cookie along. “I’ll get you one of those damn scarfs.”
The rest of us followed their dissent from our table
shouting encouragement as they made their way through the crowd of hot, messy
women.
We cheered when we saw that they had gotten as far as the
steps to the round revolving stage. Our Elvis was belting out Hound Dog and
they were this close. It was
incredible.
Then, all of a sudden to our complete amazement, we saw my
mom and Aunt Cookie take to the stage. We couldn’t believe it. And by the looks
on their faces they couldn’t either. They looked terrified. The stage was
spinning around slowly, but spinning it was. They held onto each other for dear
life, as if their seat restraints had just come off on the roller coaster.
It didn’t take long before a couple of security guards
headed towards them. The guards waited for them to make it around again, while Mom
and Aunt Cookie clung to each other until they could coordinate their footwork
well enough to get off stage without falling.
Somehow they managed to climb off the musical merry-go-round,
holding hands the whole time like a couple of second graders. The guards
pointed them in the direction of our table and they made it back none the worse
for wear and waving a white scarf over their heads. Thankfully, they didn’t come back empty handed
this time. My sister kept that scarf for years.
I Googled Elvis impersonators the other day and found our
man. In fact, there’s a picture taken right around the time we saw him. The
caption reads, “Performs patented switch kick during karate moves.”
My favorite artists have always been Elvis and The Beatles and they
still are. – Johnny Ramone
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