A few days before my yearly trip to Graceland for the Candlelight Vigil, I ran into a friend who had read some of my posts about visiting Graceland. He told me that he was one of the few people ever kicked out of Graceland. Earlier in his life, he was involved in a comedy club in Memphis and went with one of the performers to visit Graceland. During their visit, the performer left a wreath of bacon at the gravesite. This was not appreciated. They were taken to one of the buses and seated at the back to be taken off of the property. He said before they left, the bus filled with a Brownie scout troop. He said it was embarrassing. He said that he took other performers after that without incident and developed a good relationship with the people at Graceland. They were the ones that told him he was one of the few people that had been kicked out.
It appears that in one way my friend had come to know some of the insiders at Graceland. There are other types of insiders at Graceland. The Elvis Insiders Club is a group you can join to get discounts on tours and Elvis swag both at Graceland and on-line. Last year, my friend Tina went for her first Candlelight Vigil. She returned this year. Since last year, she has joined the Elvis Insiders Club. This would be a great year to get treated like a real Insider. To get the VIP treatment for the first time since I started coming to Elvis Week in 2002. To finally complete the process of blending in with the Elvis faithful. Would this be as much fun as in years past? Would I be able to experience Elvis Week with the same vision I had 12 years ago? How far away am I from growing sideburns and dyeing my hair black every August?
Chicago KidsYou may rest easily in knowing that the purpose of my trip each year continues to be to watch people. To encounter Elvis fans from all over the world and try to see what makes them tick. During my previous 12 visits, I have developed a routine that I rarely stray from. Getting the cap and shirt for each year’s event, visiting the performers’ tent, snapping pictures of many of the same people, the years seem to run together. I even end up eating at KFC most years out of habit. This Elvis Insiders Club may just be the thing to break me out of my normal routine. Maybe this brings the opportunity to experience something new and different.
Tina was returning and so was my friend Nick. We set the tone for this year’s trip during a brief stop at the edge of Memphis. I asked the group if they want to eat before we arrived at Graceland or wait until we got there. Tina said we needed to wait because we were insiders. This became rule #1: “Insiders don’t eat off-site”. Our response to anyone who wanted to do something like eat before we got there would be “You think you’re an insider but you’re really an outsider”. To explain any of our actions we would just say “That’s how insiders roll”.
Our first opportunity to take advantage of our insider status was when we parked. I flashed Tina’s Insiders Club card at the entrance to the parking lot and declared, “We’re Insiders” to take advantage of the $3 discount. Even though we were insiders, we were still there to people watch. My first opportunity to talk to other visitors was when we were taking pictures at the Graceland sign at the edge of the parking lot. For most visitors, this is the first photo opportunity. I offered to take a picture for an Illinois couple that were in town for their sons’ baseball tournament. Their son was at the ball field and they decided they would visit Graceland during a break. They had no idea that they were visiting during Elvis Week. This was my first opportunity to tell people who had never been there before about what goes on during the evening of the Candlelight Vigil. While they didn’t plan to stay for the Vigil ceremony, I think I saw them later in the morning purchasing tickets for a tour of the house.
We decided to take the tour this year. We also opted for VIP access. This would give us front of the line access to the tour and repeated access to any of the attractions. We also received a lanyard with a special VIP tag that helped affirm our VIP Insider status with the common fans in the crowd. We had about 45 minutes before our tour started and we decided to try and eat at the Rockabilly Café because it was right next to the VIP Tour loading area. There was a long line moving slow in the restaurant and our VIP passes didn’t give us front of the line access there. We stood in line behind a lady from Chicago who comes to Elvis Week every year. She had two young children wearing Elvis jumpsuits. Her son was in a stroller and her daughter would pose every time we took her picture. When we weren’t talking to them, we were looking at the photos of celebrities on the walls over the booths. I told my group that if we hurried, we might get to sit in the John Stamos’ booth. We made several John Stamos jokes. I also noticed that this was the John Denver booth. And I made a John Wilkes Booth joke.
We ate fast and stood for a very short time at the VIP booth before we were loaded onto the bus. This was the first day for a new feature on the house tour. Now they issue you an Ipad that provides the audio portion of the tour. It also has pictures and additional information on the screen. On the bus ride from the visitors’ center to the house, we set up our iPads and were introduced to our celebrity tour guide whose voice would be guiding us through Graceland, John Stamos. Our bus unloaded in a special VIP area and our group was allowed to break line in front of others.
I didn’t want to take many pictures during the tour. I feel that most of the photos that I might take could be found in books and on-line in better versions than I could take with my phone. I also didn’t care to have someone else in my group take my picture in front of these places. This was a busy day at Graceland and I would be in other people’s way too much for my comfort. But then I started noticing some of the photos and paintings of Elvis and his family on the wall. I decided that it would be fun to take selfies on the tour with Elvis photobombs. This would provide a different twist to the pictures. It also freaked out other people on the tour. Although I was pointing my camera phone at them, I was actually taking a picture of myself. They would freak out and try to move out of the way. The fact that we all had headphones on made it more difficult to communicate with each other so many of them never understood that they weren’t in my way. Because the selfie has become a more common type of photo, it has made it easier to sneak photos of other people in the crowd. I just point my phone at the person that I want to take a picture of and pretend to pose before I snap the photo. I did take a few pictures this way during the day.
