Published Thursday, March 2, 2000, in the San Jose Mercury News

God, Elvis and Me

Religion and the King left their mark, but it was the gospel of Grandma that truly moved her

BY SANDRA SMITH

AS I try to tiptoe past the age of 50, some things have become inextricably mixed in my memories -- Elvis Presley, my grandmother and Pentecostal revival meetings.

I was born in San Jose and grew up in Campbell -- a sleepy farming community then a suburb of today's Silicon Valley. San Tomas Expressway now rushes past Rosemary Lane Elementary School where Hamilton Avenue was once a dead-end country road.

Life's slow rhythms were dictated by the agricultural seasons. Front doors were left unlocked. And children knew someone would catch them at whatever mischief they were up to and tell their parents.

I picked apricots and plums from the orchards on the way to school, and went to Sunday services with my grandmother at the small Pentecostal church on Gilman.

The church was down the street from the Campbell Press, a local newspaper where I worked after high school. My job was to type the whole paper on an electric typewriter and manually justify the columns by adding and subtracting spaces.
Two of my uncles were Pentecostal preachers. But Uncle Pat began drinking and cussing and then he quit the church. Uncle Bill, on the other hand, was serious about his religion. Grandma wouldn't miss one of his meetings and often brought me with her.

If you ever attend an old-fashioned Pentecostal revival meeting, prepare to be caught up in the spirit. Smell the nervous sweat, hear the throat-clearing preparation and the foot shuffling. Feel the tension build and count the sinners among your friends and neighbors to figure out how many will be saved before the service is over.

Nothing compares to this experience. For me, joyful noise from trumpets, tambourines, praise-God shouts and Grandma speaking in tongues eased any boredom that might have resulted from the sermon. Grandma had had me baptized twice to make sure it took.

The church we attended was small, with altar and pews built of warm, golden oak. Undecorated windows let the light through, leaving no shadows. The preacher would begin in a small and intimate voice, whispering that one would be saved if one only believed.

Put away your anger, guilt and worldly greed, he would plead. Forgive your enemies, love your neighbors. The old, sweet hymns could be heard softly in the background, subliminally urging me to participate even as they tugged at my heart.

I swore I wouldn't get caught up, but the air crackled with faith and hope and Grandma praying out loud. Hallelujahs and amens rang from the rafters. Pretty soon the preacher shouted that we were all sinners. I walked up the red-carpeted center aisle in a daze, and knelt down. My head bowed and for those few moments I believed with a fervor that wasn't possible under any other circumstance.

Everything embarrasses an adolescent, though, particularly uninhibited behavior, so I eventually quit going to church with Grandma. By then I knew some of her history. Married to a brutal man, she still never stopped believing and praying to God for help.

I now understand that her faith sustained her. Grandma got a divorce and became a single parent long before there was any public discourse on how to help women and families in such trying circumstances. She continued her involvement in the church, raised her children and earned the respect of everyone.

A neighbor later invited me to Southern Baptist services. We went to a modern church, all angles and simple stained-glass windows. I managed to get baptized once more during church summer camp. I believed I was saved for good after that.

But the Baptists lost me one summer during vacation Bible school when an instructor hugged me too often. She gave me gifts -- a tiny, white New Testament and a picture of Jesus framed in cheap, white metal sprinkled with silver glitter. She thought I was possessed by God because I always knew the answers, but I was really possessed by a good memory.

Occasionally, I went to Lutheran services with a friend. The formality of the great arches and the beauty of the time-darkened jeweled windows created a certain measure of peace. I was less embarrassed.
But I couldn't sing the hymns and I never knew when to stand up or kneel in the mahogany pews. I thought the more dignified services would be an antidote to the emotionalism of the Pentecostals, but it seemed instead a tepid celebration of faith.

A couple of years later, I became comfortable with my smug, adolescent knowledge that God was dead (he died during the '60s). I also firmly believed that hypocrisy was king of organized religion.
Then, Grandma discovered Elvis Presley gospel records. ``He's blessed,'' she said, ``with a beautiful voice to praise God.'' I tried to tell her about his other music. But Grandma didn't care. She taught me that good done even accidentally is still good.

I never really did stop believing in a greater being, thanks to my grandmother's example. If she could sustain her faith through a hard life full of trouble and disappointment, then something must exist to believe in. She showed me how I should aspire to live. She never, never gave up.

Grandma's unqualified, no-questions-asked love was evidenced by her approval and belief in me. I assumed it was a grandmother's nature to love, and to give beautiful red coats with fur collars and red, patent leather shoes. I thought everyone had a grandmother who was tolerant, who taught how to be tough and not to whine about what life handed out.
Grandma spent two years dying in a rest home. She wasn't herself and gave up Elvis for Kenny Rogers. I had to sing ``The Gambler'' when I visited.

Sometimes I remember the dream I had a few months after she died. Grandma was sitting at her kitchen table dressed to go to church, hair and makeup perfect. She smiled and said, ``Sandy, I'm all right.'' I woke up that next morning knowing she was where she expected to be.

Today I mix elements of Grandma's simple faith with things I've learned along the way. I have developed a personal philosophy I can believe in. Her legacy was to make me understand that belief was essential.

Now, whenever I hear an Elvis song, I smile and wistfully wiggle my toes that no longer wear red patent leather shoes. I am left with a never-ending search for answers to questions I barely know how to ask, and bittersweet memories of Grandma, God and me.


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Sandra Smith lives in Santa Cruz.