Thirty years gone
When Elvis died my mother went into a pitch-black depression that lasted almost a week. She sat on the living room floor surrounded by his records, listening to Viva Las Vegas over and over and sobbing. It was the first time I'd ever seen someone so utterly devastated by the death of someone they'd never met.
Then again, Elvis had already made his mark on music by the time I became culturally aware, and it wasn't until years later that I began to appreciate the magnitude of his impact. My mother came into adulthood in the 1950s, and for a socially progressive young woman in the South, Elvis was almost a religious figure. The idea that one of the idols of her youth could die like that — so suddenly, in such an ignoble manner — was simply more than she could take. Each of us mark our changing seasons in different ways; I suspect that for my mother, the death of the King marked the end of her youth.
7 Comments:
Beautiful...
VERY touching.
Great post. Thanks for sharing that with us.
You know, I remember where I was and what I was doing when I found out Elvis died, because my friend's mother had a similar reaction.
It was the summer between sixth grade and the start of big bad middle school. I'd gone to my friend Julie's house to hang out, and found her sitting on the porch -- she told me we had to hang out either outside or at my house, because her mother was way upset over Elvis dying, and was sitting in the living room crying and playing records.
We ended up back at my house. My mom wasn't an Elvis fan.
I never thought of mourning The King as mourning something in oneself. I always thought of it as something bizarre and mockable. But I think you're probably totally right. Well said.
Elvis died on my 11th birthday.
And when Kurt Cobain died, I think the reaction was the same. The same for John Lennon. (Maybe in Kurt's case, he was too young for people to really feel it was the end of their youth, however.) - Mary T
I too remember hearing that the King had passed. I was surprised that such a figure could beat immortality. Jimi Hendrix...now that's a man I wish was still around!
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