Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Elvis the Pelvis


According to KHQ, today is some kind of anniversary for Elvis so they mentioned his appearance on the Ed Sullivan show. That brought back a flood of memories! One of my fondest. Although my mom and dad never gave us much trouble about listening to rock and roll, they didn't like it very much personally. Daddy teased us about Elvis' gyrations all the time and Mother said that her mother was upset when she listened to Frank Sinatra as a teenager. Daddy bought two ironing boards and two irons so Julia and I could iron (Can you imagine having to iron every piece of clothing these days?), talk, and listen to the radio thus killing two birds with one stone. I remember those hot summer days with a big basket of clothes (hardest on top) and a Coke bottle with a sprayer to keep them damp and sang and danced to the good stuff. We hardly knew we were working. Ahhhhh! Anyway, back to Elvis.

Daddy was pretty strict about the TV schedule when he was home and, pretty much, we watched what he watched. He loved boxing which dominated Friday nights so we gladly accepted babysitting jobs so we could watch 77 Sunset Strip. The kids in our ward were devastated when we knew that Elvis was to appear on the Ed Sullivan Show because we had a youth fireside that night and the bishop wouldn't relent. Mother and Daddy wouldn't have cared whether Julia and I went to fireside or not, but we were torn between the fireside and Elvis and we knew there was no way Daddy would watch Elvis. However, the bishop, smart man that he was, did relent by and let us watch only the segment about Elvis (most of the show he was only shown from the waist up because his movements were considered "sinful" and outrageous, but there was one full shot of him.). We all swooned and talked about it for weeks.
In case you're wondering about our mission--so are we! Garth got a clean bill of health before Christmas so we turned everything to the bishop. We waited and waited. Finally, he interviewed us and said he was sending everything to the next person--the stake president. On Monday we got a call that our local clerk was still putting the medical information on the computer. So we're still twiddling our thumbs waiting. Hopefully, President Leavitt will call this week. Otherwise, all is well.





1 comment:

Susan said...

I love hearing these stories about when you and Mom were young. I especially laughed at TV only allowing Elvis' top half to be shown - my, how the "standards of decency" have changed!