Why Crying at Elvis Presley’s Grave is One of My Favorite Summer 2024 Memories

Summer 2024 is coming to an end soon, and it’s really one of the best summers I’ve experienced in a long time. I am often busy with work and other family obligations, to which most people can relate. But this summer saw my busy schedule and the busy schedules of my friends and extended family members aligned to where we actually got to see each other more often and spend some quality time together.

The summer kicked off with a long overdue trip in June with my aunt, Lisa, and it’s easily my favorite part of Summer 2024. I can recall for a number of years Lisa, an Elvis Presley superfan, talking about how we should go to Graceland. I had never visited the iconic Memphis landmark but was always interested in seeing it. It’s truly one of the most American attractions in the United States: A stunning mansion owned by one of music’s biggest stars ever, which also captures what happens when someone who grew up dirt-poor gets more money than he knows what to do with. (I’m looking at you, Pool Room, with your wild upholstered walls!)

Miraculously, this year saw us get it together and plan a trip to Graceland. It was my first trip and her ninth. We even did it up right and stayed at The Guest House, the stunning Elvis-themed hotel next to Graceland on Elvis Presley Blvd. The place was spotless, and the staff provided incredible service. I truly can’t recommend staying there enough.

For my entire life, Lisa has lived out of state. When I was a kid, getting to see her when she came back home to Michigan was always special. Our family is chock-full of funny people, but I’ve always thought she was one of the funniest, and she still is. I’m well into my 30s now, but this was going to be the first time we actually went on an adventure together, just she and I.

I drove from Michigan to her home in Indiana and crashed there for the night. The next day, we woke up bright and early and made our way from Indiana to Tennessee. Factoring various rest stops, it was about an eight-hour drive. The entire time, we just talked and vented about anything and everything. Seemingly nothing was off limits, including family trauma, which, I swear, isn’t as depressing as it sounds.

For example, part of our trauma bonding involved calling my uncle, Mark, who is also hilarious, to make fun of my late grandfather’s longtime girlfriend. This was the woman he left my grandmother for, so our feelings about her aren’t exactly sunny. Regardless, there was such remarkable catharsis about making fun of her that I’m genuinely thinking about buying this “At Least My Trauma Made Me Funny” t-shirt for our entire family.

Looking back, trauma was seemingly an undercurrent to nearly everything we did during our trip. Again, that sounds a lot more depressing than it was, but I experienced a sort of sobering liberation from confronting various traumas during this trip, both personal and historical. It happened when listening to some incredible blues musicians at B.B. King’s Blues Club on Beale St. The blues fearlessly looks trauma of all kinds dead in the eye, which is part of what makes the genre so moving.

It absolutely happened when visiting the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel, the site where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. The museum is meticulously curated and tackles head-on the greatest sin in the history of the United States: The horrific treatment of Black people, from slavery to the rise of Jim Crow laws to the struggles of the Civil Rights Movement and everywhere in between. Every American should visit the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel. There are not enough words to describe just how unbelievable the museum is.

It even happened at Graceland, and I didn’t even see it coming.

Elvis is a complicated figure within the scope of music and American history. He was an obscenely gifted singer who was insanely charismatic and so good-looking that it borders on stupid. At the same time, he was a white man who performed and profited off of Black music. His downfall due to his addiction to prescription drugs also serves as a cautionary tale. Elvis represents joy and pain. Promise and failure. Hope and despair.

Elvis is America.

Walking through Graceland, it’s hard not to feel those strong, conflicting emotions. Even when listening to the Graceland audio tour narrated by John Stamos on my headphones, I could feel a rumbling deep within, and it all came to a head in the Meditation Garden, where Elvis and his family are buried.

As Stamos narrated my way to the Meditation Garden, I took in all of the graves. Lisa Marie Presley is there now, as is her son, Benjamin Keough. Stamos’ narration comes to a close and then leads into the playing of “If I Can Dream” in my headphones. Around the second verse of “If I Can Dream,” which is my favorite Elvis song, I found myself standing in front of Elvis’s grave:

“There must be peace and understanding sometime/Strong winds of promise that will blow away the doubt and fear/If I can dream of a warmer sun/Where hope keeps shining on everyone/Tell me why, oh why, oh why won’t that sun appear.”

I couldn’t hold it in any longer, and I cried for the first time in a very long time. Sure, I cried because the moment was overwhelming, but I think I cried for more than just that. I cried for Elvis and the tragedy in his family. I cried for my late brother, who, like Elvis, also struggled with addiction. I cried for the many traumas of my family. And I cried for America and its many traumas.

It was a moment when I realized I was holding onto a lot more inside than I realized, and it was a moment when I let a lot of it go. To repeat: It was a sobering liberation.

I took from my trip to Graceland and Memphis memories that I’ll look back on fondly forever, but more importantly and unexpectedly, I let go of a lot, too. In large part, I have my Aunt Lisa to thank for that. (And Elvis, too.) I have a hunch we’ll try to plan another adventure. (It turns out we travel very well together.) However, next time, maybe a little less trauma. Well, except for making fun of my late grandfather’s longtime girlfriend. That was just fun.

Signing the wall at Graceland with a message that was a massive understatement. (Photo by Erica Banas/Aunt Lisa.)

Erica Banas is a news blogger who’s been covering the rock/classic rock world since 2014. The coolest event she’s ever covered in person was the 2021 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. (Sir Paul McCartney inducting Foo Fighters? C’mon now!) She’s also well-versed in etiquette and extraordinarily nice. #TransRightsAreHumanRights