Elvis Lives

I don't usually think about a week,which seems organized for manmade purposes--no moon or sun behind that raft of seven days. More as if they ran out of names after Saturday and had to start over again. But the first week of the year deserves a little consideration. Here it is the 8th, a long week after the pizzazz of New Year's Eve. In fact this time a week ago it was still December, still 2009. So last year! And then we had that New Year's weekend, kind of the foredeck of a cruise ship as it eases into the harbor. So we didn't get down the gangplank into the business of 2010 until Monday. I'd call it a test week, like a tester pancake. We're not expected to actually eat the week, are we? We are? Fine. I say it was a bunch of practice serves, though. (How'd this tennis ball get in the pancake batter?) Even if one serve went in, for show, on Monday. The other four needed work, needed style.

Like January needs Elvis. It really does. I wasn't going to make much of his birthday today. I was never a huge fan. And he's already pretty overpraised in a wall-to-wall, Kraft foods/Life magazine kind of way. But then I got an email from Sylvia supposing that I'd be ruminating on him. So I did, a bit. And decided that January needs Elvis, especially eight days in, as the novelty of 2010 is wearing off and the Christmas trees are beginning to lie down in the snow outside the houses. Doesn't even matter if it's young Elvis or old Elvis. The spangled white jumpsuit works about as well as the red open-necked shirt. January needs a little adrenaline. (Or else it needs to hibernate.) It could use more Heartbreak Hotel, Jailhouse Rock, and Blue Suede Shoes. Jan. is prone to go gray, or to go prone. It could use a visit from Dr. Rhythm and Dr. Blues.

I mean, sure, it's got Martin Luther King Jr., but I'm talking Elvis Pelvis. A little electricity on the eighth. The curled lip, the sideburns, the greasy forelock. The juke joint, and the rest of them: Son House, Big Mama Thornton, Howlin' Wolf. I mean, I'm already way in over my head here. I'm just saying it would do January some good. A little fervor.