As I brushed my teeth next to a “Pleasure Dispenser” in a dim truck stop bathroom, I started having my first real doubts. When I had told my family that friends and I were going to Graceland, the huge mansion where Elvis Presley lived and then died in 1977, I couldn’t keep the smirk out of my voice. A mythical sort of absurdity surrounds Graceland, and I thought of it in the same way I thought of the giant Ball of Twine in Darwin (Minnesota) or the Spam Museum in Austin (Minnesota).

Twine, Spam and Elvis Presley. All three seemed to embody a certain amount of whimsy, but I was intrigued with the thought of seeing Graceland. So three friends and I packed into my battered Ford Festiva with a road map and made the 12-hour drive from Appleton, Wisconsin, where I attended college, to Memphis, Tennessee, home to Elvis Presley's dream home.

We were anticipating it more for the comedic value than any professed love for Elvis’s music. We pondered the idea that some people dreamed most of their lives of reaching Graceland, and puffed ourselves up at our intellectual superiority over those poor saps. Still, it would be a fun road trip story to tell our family and friends. It seemed less great as the endless hours rolled by. My foot felt closer and closer to falling off.

My reservations grew the next day as I checked us into a dilapidated motel.

“Are there three of you in that car?” the woman at the desk pointedly asked, ready to tack on the charges.

“No, there’s only two,” I returned. Well, there was. I wasn’t in the car.

Tuesday morning we were ready to immerse ourselves in Elvis mania, but a quick call to Graceland for directions shocked us back to reality. It was not open Tuesdays. In all our planning we really hadn’t considered the possibility that we would drive through five states to reach our destination only to find it closed.

After a quick powwow, we decided to see what else Memphis had to offer. Our first stop was Beale Street, that hive of Memphis blues and home of some of the best barbeque found in the United States.

Stores with postcards and collectibles crowding the front windows lined the famous street, and music wafted out of doorways. The sound of blues drifting through the yellow morning air and down the gritty streets created an atmosphere of age and reluctant stoicism, of history gone but not forgotten. Creased black men with hats perched comfortably on their heads watched us pass by from their doorways.

The next morning, with a reassuring phone call to an open Graceland, the time had come. We didn’t know what to expect. I had thought cynically (and almost hopefully) that Graceland was probably one big tacky gift shop where velvet Elvises abounded.

However, near the entrance we were greeted by a magnificent grand piano framed by a stained glass doorway embellished with bright peacocks. This was surprisingly tasteful, considering the garish opulence I had thought we’d find. Farther into the house, the adornments were no less extravagant but a bit dated. The Jungle Room, with green shag carpet and wild animal print furniture, complete with a waterfall on one wall, was a retro explosion of color.