|
|
|
|
|
"Elvis
Comes to Angie," #150 Swapping Stories
This story is a story that happened to me when I was a little girl. Anybody in here five years old? I was about five when this happened. When I was a little girl, we had television and all, but we hadn't had electricity a long time because I lived up at Angie, way out in the woods. Out in the sticks is where I lived. We didn't have electricity until I was about five years old. When we got it, it was just wonderful. We'd turn them lights on. Flick them on. My daddy bought a TV set, and everybody in the community would come around and watch TV. They'd just stand there and stare. There wasn't really great programs on. It was Kate Smith and stuff like that. A man named Steve Allen was on. Anyway, the funny thing was that at about this time, Mr. Elvis Presley, whom all of you've heard of, I'm sure, got famous. He was on the TV, but I really didn't know that people on the TV was real because my mama kept saying, "Them people in movies is not real, Mary Etta. That's not true." So I didn't believe Elvis Presley was a real person. So I was not believing in Elvis. He was not real, he was just on TV. One day, I was over at Mr. Murray Soams' [store] in Angie, Louisiana. . . . Now Uncle Earl Long was the governor of the State of Louisiana at this time. I'm sure you've heard a lot about Uncle Earl. But Uncle Earl was the only person we knew that had a Cadillac car, except the mortician. The mortician sure wouldn't drive no pink Cadillac. So we thought Uncle Earl had come to Angie because we'd seen this great big, pink Cadillac sitting over at Mr. Henry McMillan's store. He had a gas store, a pumping station, whatever you want to call it, a gas station. Anyway, we were sitting there in Mr. Murray's store and Tommy Soams, that was Mr. Murray's daughter, she said, "Mary Etta, Uncle Earl is over at Mr. Henry's in his Cadillac. There's his car." We were just thrilled to death because none of us had ever met the governor of Louisiana, Uncle Earl. So Tommy and I got up enough courage--I was five years old--to walk across the road to Mr. Murray's to see Uncle Earl, we thought. When we got over there, Uncle Earl wasn't over there in his pink Cadillac. It was Elvis Presley. Honey, he was sitting right there on a Coke case, drinking an RC Cola. And good-looking! He was the best looking man you ever saw in your life. I was just standing--I was five years old, a little bitty kid. I was standing there looking at him. He said to me, "Hello, little girl." I just thought the world had come to an end. I just said, "Hi." I just said, "Hi" to Elvis. I mean, "Hi." Anyway, Elvis bought me and Tommy a Coke. We sat there and drank that Coke and looked at Elvis Presley. I want to tell you one thing, that was the most unusual and thrilling day of my life, of my young life, was to see Elvis in Angie. When he left, he got in his pink Cadillac and got all of his men assembled in and hulled them all in. He waved goodbye and he said, "You all be good." And we tried, Elvis, we really tried. But we're not too good, I'm afraid. |
|
|
