Only fools rush in.

Today is the 30th anniversary of Elvis's death, and I've been to Graceland six times.

Not the the two are related.

When you live in Memphis and someone comes to visit you, it seems remiss not to take them down Elvis Presley Blvd., past the car lots and the Heartbreak Hotels, past the prostitutes and the loafers, to Graceland. It is the terminus of every half-cocked high school road trip, the chorus of a Paul Simon song, and verse two of that Marc Cohen song about Memphis. It's quintessential Americana, and a physical example of too much and not enough.

That being said, it's one of the most underwhelming places I've ever been. Six times.

The house itself would not be out of place in a typical middle-class neighborhood in the city you live in. The inside is garish, but only because its saturated in 1970s. Mostly you think to yourself: this is it? The Jungle Room is something your suspect uncle Roy would convert his game room into to lure chicks. (And "chicks" is totally the right word.) Complete with the 4-foot stuffed animal propped on the chair.

It wouldn't even make it on an episode of Cribs. Though it does have a graveyard and an eternal flame. But heck, even my grandpa has an eternal flame (seriously; it's at his church in Valley Center, Ca.).

The whole time you're there, marvelling at the fresh flowers on the grave--because that means someone just brought them--and observing the reverent quiet, you wonder which is the sadder: young Elvis, naive and full of promise, or old Elvis, trying like hell to get it all back? Because you can't look at young Elvis without knowing how it all ends.

The whole thing is a cautionary tale, a monument to that most American of sentiments: schadenfreude.


Blue Hawaii is a good movie, though.