Chapter 1
The Day We All Dream Of
Amarillo is a town in the middle of nowhere, but it feels like you’re in the middle of everywhere. It just depends on your perspective. If you grew up in a small town of two thousand, even twenty thousand, then it feels like the big city in the panhandle of West Texas. But if you grew up in Dallas, obviously it might seem like some Podunk cow town.
Today is about the greatest day of my life, filled with butterflies and joy. I’ve been lucky enough to find the woman of my dreams in my mid-twenties. You might ask yourself why I would take the time to write all of this about myself on my wedding day. But what better time to take a moment and reflect on how I got here?
Let me introduce myself. My name is Travis Golden; I’m twenty-seven years old, and I have a twin sister, Terra, who is twelve minutes older than me (she reminds me of this fact regularly). The last ten years have been crazy, beginning in high school and going to college with my sister for a while. We’re not your typical twins, although we do many things together, we didn’t always do everything together. We were extremely close but led different lives, as we grew older. Often as you grow up as a twin, you’re so close no one can understand your bond. It’s hard to socialize with anyone other than your sibling. But in our situation and with our upbringing, we had a different view of the world around us. We were both great at sports from an early age, but when we were ten years old, Terra suffered a freak accident playing softball, breaking her ankle and leg in multiple places.
The rehab and healing process lasted almost a year, and it took a toll on her. She never wanted to push it again in any sport. She was timid, afraid to be aggressive. By the time we were in high school, she had given up competitive sports altogether. She practiced yoga and went running for fitness, but she did nothing competitive. Still, she was my number one fan, pushing me, coaching me, and giving me details and feedback no one else had the nerve to. She always found that one thing to keep me pushing it. Which, in a way, is why I’m here trying to fasten this stupid bow tie while fighting a hangover.
As I’m nearing the point where I’m about to give up, my mother walks in the room.
“Mom, I know what you’re thinking, but I don’t want to hear it right now. If you…”
Before I can finish my sentence, she breezes over fixes my tie. “I’m so proud of you, Travis. You’ve picked the most amazing bride. She’s as beautiful inside as she is outside. Your grandmother is looking down on you with a big smile.”
“Mom, if you keep this up, I’m going to start crying. I’m already struggling, but this is going to push me over the edge.”
My mom always knows how to pull my heartstrings. Well, let’s be honest. Every mom knows how to do that. My mother had my sister and me at a very young age—four months after she graduated high school. Luckily, she didn’t show until close to the end, and she was able to go to a local community college. With a mother only eighteen years older than you, it’s a lot different than what most kids experience growing up. When my grandmother passed away, I was only twenty-two, and my mother was only forty. She passed away from Alzheimer’s when she was only sixty-four years old; it had begun around her sixtieth birthday. She was doing okay, but she took a turn for the worse after a car wreck, and never bounced back. It was too young for both of us to lose someone so influential in our lives.
“You look amazing in your tuxedo, and I love the haircut too. I know you enjoyed growing your hair out and looking like a surfer for the past year and a half, but I’m so happy to have my clean-cut boy back.”
“Mom, stop it. I’m glad I could make you happy with a simple haircut. Do you remember the first time I wanted to grow my hair out, I had to convince you and Dad to let me do it?”
“Oh my God, I almost forgot! You were so cute. It was the end of your eighth-grade year, and you were going into high school and wanted to change your look, so you’d have a better chance with the girls.”
My mom starts laughing, along with some of my groomsmen. Right then my best man and best friend since college, Chris, looks up with a huge-ass grin on his face, which coincidentally was the same look he’d given me the night I met my bride-to-be. Chris and I had been working as bartenders at a local bar in Amarillo when she walked in with her group of friends. We laughed because often when a group of girls came into the bar there would be three to four of them max, but there were seven of them. We gave them a hard time, like two single male bartenders should when a bunch of cute girls walks in.
I remember Leighton specifically not because I ended up marrying her, but because of the way we met. As I walked up and asked her friend what she would like to drink, Leighton started to yell at me (she must have pre-gamed before coming to the bar). I remember it like it was yesterday.
“Hey bar dude, hey you, sir. Bro, come on man. I want a drink.” Don’t get me wrong, she was cute, but damn was this girl drunk. She was already stumbling. All she would get out of me was a coffee or water.
I started to make my way to her. “Miss, you need to slow down,” That’s when it happened; she leaned over and started throwing up all over the bar and all over me. Everything she had gotten into that small frame of hers made its way out the same way it had gone in.
It was a great way to make a first impression. I worked at Hoots Pub, a great local bar for concerts and local country talent that comes through West Texas. And that night was no exception. We had a sold-out show so I had to run home, change, and get back to work. I didn’t see her for the rest of the night, for obvious reasons. A week later, a cute girl that looked just like her, dressed to kill in tight, torn jeans, high heels, and a low-cut red top walked up to me with big West Texas hair, snapping her gum.
“Hey, I need to talk to you, hey…hey!”
I was a little busy at the time, and I was pretty sure she had thrown up all over me the previous week. I wasn’t in a hurry to head back over for a second helping of tequila chum. “I’ll be over there in one moment as soon as I’m done over here. Give me a minute.” I know I snapped at her, but come on, she had thrown up on me.
“Hey, Buddy, I got all dressed up to come apologize for throwing up all over you last week. The least you can do is get your ass over here and give me your full attention. I think I deserve that much— mainly because I know I look damn good right now.” And I’ll tell you what, she did. I can say that knowing now she isn’t a cocky person; she isn’t stuck-up. She was trying to build herself up for the conversation because she was nervous after how we met.
The moment she’d thrown up on me, Chris shot me this same smile. It was a look of, Dude that hot chick just threw up on you.
“Wait, what is this story? I need to hear this shit, and we have plenty of time to kill.”
So of course, my mom starts in on the story of how I came to her and sat her down about how it was time for me to decide how my hair looked and which clothes I wore. I wanted to look good for girls and my friends, and she shouldn’t be making my fashion choices anymore. I could only imagine what it was like for a mother to have her little boy finally come to her all grown-up, but still so young, telling her he was ready to make his own decisions. Little did my friends know that was the least important part of the story.
As usual, my mom was about to do some teaching.
