Elvis Presley and Ego
Recently people have made comments that the people around Elvis Presley didn’t care about him, and I decided to share some of my contact with the people who worked with him. These were people who didn’t let their own Ego get in the way of trying to help the King. They had true concern for him. They had come to me and asked me to come to Las Vegas and counsel Elvis. My first question was why me? Their answer was that they felt that because of the way I work with people, that Elvis and I would connect easily and that I could help him get back on track.
My Ego could have gotten in the way; first to note that there was no money involved and secondly I was not a professional counselor. The first person was Alva Boyles ( Elvis’ second drummer) In the early 70’s, Alva asked me to come to LV to meet Elvis and the results were terrible. Elvis disappeared right after the second show (when we were scheduled to meet). The second time was about a year or so later, when Ed Parker Sr. (Elvis’ black belt instructor and personal body guard) asked me to come to Las Vegas again to work with Elvis. Yes, I told him about my prior experience and Ed said no problem I’ve already cleared it. My arrival was somewhat eventful as Ed Parker & Ed Dewey(my partner in Rixx lotion) were having a little fun treating me as if they were my body guards. When you added that to the fact that I was a Sen. Ted Kennedy look alike, we were arriving a the MGM in style. The next thing happened as I was registering. The front received a phone call and then said to me: “Mr Govan you have the Presidential Suite and everything is taken care of.” When
I asked who? The clerk pointed to a man sitting high above the casino in the catbird seat – the general manager. He gave me a salute and I saluted back. My body guard team asked me what that was about. I told them, “That was Mr. S. I counseled his daughter about ten years ago, and I think I just got a thank you.” I was scheduled to see Elvis after the second show and we had the perfect place to meet – in my Presidential suite. So we settled in and went to the High Ly games to wait and attend the second show. Ed Parker was off making sure our seats were all confirmed. But, instead, Ed came running up to our seats at the High Ly game. Out of breath he said “You won’t believe this! Elvis has cancelled the second show and he has left the building; I can’t find him anywhere!” I stayed an extra day in Vegas, but Elvis was nowhere to be found. Remember this story sounds like its about me, but it’s really about letting his fans know the there were really people around him that cared and took action. They used their GO POWER! The results weren’t as planned, but the caring and effort was there.
