“I need a truck ASAP!” My cousin Regina shouted so loud I had to hold my phone away from my ear. It was two a.m. on the night before my wedding. Had you asked me five years earlier what I’d be doing at this hour, I’d have told you I’d either be winding down from a fabulous rehearsal dinner or getting my beauty sleep so I’d look my best the next day.
But there’d been no rehearsal dinner, just like there’d been no rehearsal. Both got scrapped in the frantic sprint to the finish line as we prepared the Haunted House for the wedding. The house no longer looked haunted, but it was filled with spirits tonight. Over twenty of us, a mixture of family and friends, were still going strong.
“Regina, what the hell are you talking about?” I shouted back. Before she could answer, I heard honking from outside. “Hang on, Regina.” I put my hand over the mic and called out, “That’s Uncle Fred with the pizzas. I need two guys to help carry them in.” Aunt Delilah’s sons Johnny and Frankie, who made flunking school an art form, dropped their paintbrushes and ran out. They’d each polish off at least a slice before getting the pies inside, but after working fourteen hours straight, they deserved it.
I returned to the call. “What were you saying, Regina?”
“I need a truck out at Collins Hall, and I need it now.”
Collins Hall was one of the wedding venues I hadn’t even considered because it ran a minimum of $200 a head. “What are you doing out there?”
“I told you I got this new waitressing gig, right? So I made sure to get this shift cause it’s right before your wedding and they always leave the flowers, hundreds of gorgeous, beautiful, stunning, healthy flowers. Nobody takes them home. Crazy, right? And of course, these high-flyers didn’t touch a single bouquet, not a one. Nobody even took the centerpieces. And they’re freakin’ roses, Amber, roses! Can you believe it?”
Regina wasn’t the brightest star in our family’s constellation, but she’d done good. I looked around the room. Who could I send? The open bed in Dylan’s pickup took far too much wind. I spied Vinny talking to one of my cousins. Much as I appreciated him coming, he’d been more hindrance than help. Vinny couldn’t work and talk at the same time, and since he was always talking, he was usually distracting someone else. But he’d arrived in a massive SUV. That’d be perfect. “Vinny! Can you drive out to Collins Hall ASAP to pick up flowers?”
He gave me a thumbs up. “You got it.”
“OK, Regina, hold tight, someone’s on the way.”
I hung up and ran into the kitchen. My parents had, of course, flipped out when they learned they wouldn’t be paying for the wedding. Though I’d won the first battle, the war stretched on. The next week, they’d insisted on coming out to the Haunted House. They agreed it had charm and beautiful grounds, but were appalled at the state of the kitchen. They insisted on replacing the appliances as a wedding gift, and I was too grateful for the offer to fight them. They favored buying new residential appliances but capitulated when Dylan found a deal on two-year-old commercial units at one of the many restaurants closing down due to the bum economy.
Twelve women chopped, stirred, and kneaded in all corners of the kitchen. They were, of course, all family. The last thing we needed was one of my non-Italian friends getting in the way, and besides, I needed Libby supervising the decorations with my sorority sisters.
Maria Rose chopped cabbage on the long counter by the sink. That girl was a terror with a chef’s knife. I put my hand on her shoulder.
“What’s up, Amber?”
“I need you to ride out to Collins Hall with Vinny. Regina’s got a whole wedding’s worth of flowers they’re just going to throw away.”
“Don’t be stupid, Amber.” She lifted the cutting board and slid the cabbage into a bowl. “If she’s got that many flowers, you want as much space as possible to bring them back. I’d just take up space.”
“Vinny doesn’t know Regina. It’s better if you’re there.”
She hacked the next head in half. “So give him her number. He’s not an idiot, is he?”
No, he certainly wasn’t. But I was starting to have my doubts about Maria Rose. “You’ll be a big help there. Besides, you shouldn’t be chopping with your broken finger.”
She dropped the knife and faced me. “What broken finger?”
“The one I’m going to snap if you don’t get your ass in that SUV.” I pointed out the door, and she finally got the hint. All day I’d tried putting her together with Vinny, but she was too valuable in the kitchen and he too much in the way. A half-hour drive each direction was perfect, it would give him plenty of time to realize just how hot a property she was.
Maria Rose washed her hands, smoothed out her dress, and faced me. “How do I look?”
“Like an angel.” And she did. She’d come here to work, not to turn heads, so for once, there was nothing ostentatious about her outfit or makeup, and she had a healthy flush from cooking in the hot kitchen. I kissed her cheek and whispered in her ear, “Be sure to ask him about his Mamma. Now go!” I slapped her butt, and she scurried out the door.
The deafening buzz of loudspeaker feedback reverberated from the great room. I shoved my fingers in my ears. “Angelo! Turn that crap down.”
“Sorry, Amber.” Angelo unplugged his electric guitar from the amp. “We were just testing the sound.”
I relaxed my arms. “What are you testing it in here for? Aren’t you guys setting up outside?”
“Well, yeah. But you know…,” he shrugged, “in case of rain or something.”
I stuck a finger in his face, “It is not going to rain on my wedding day.”
His face turned stiff and pale. Poor Angelo. He was only 14, and the deranged bride routine was just too much for him. He backed away, but fortunately, his 16-year-old cousin Janine, the lead singer of the teen band that six of my cousins formed for the wedding, stepped in and took my hand. “No one’s predicting rain, Amber, but it never hurts to be prepared. And we thought after all the old farts clear out, this room would be perfect for an after-hours dance party.”
I pulled Janine and Angelo in for a teary-eyed hug. They were doing great, all of them were. Angelo squirmed out of my grasp, but Janine patted my back, saying, “It’s going to be alright.”
Across the great room, Libby pointed my way. Dylan came rushing over. “Come on, Amber, let’s go.”
“Go? Go where?”
Dylan took my hand. “Home. You need your sleep before the wedding.”
“But there’s so much to do here.”
He pulled me toward the door. “And so many amazing people to do it. Libby will make sure everything gets done. Remember, she plans parties for a living.”
“Yeah, right. She’s a lawyer’s wife for a living.”
“She’s still a professional.” He yanked me toward the door. “You’ve done all you can for today.”
I thought people would be angry at my leaving while they continued to work, but all I heard was “See you tomorrow, Amber,” “You’ll be great, Amber,” and Libby’s “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of everything.”
With so many amazing spirits in the Haunted House, was it any wonder I wanted to make it my home?
Kyle rapped the side of his champagne glass with the back of a knife. Slowly, the crowd of 400 settled into something approaching silence. True silence was never heard among my family. To us, silence was the sound of the dead, not of a vibrant family celebrating life. It was hopeless trying to rein in the kids running and screaming on the lawn in front of the Haunted House. If the adults had to speak a bit louder to be heard, so be it. Janine dashed over to Kyle with her microphone, the same one she’d used to sing us down the aisle three hours earlier.
It had been a strange wedding by any account. The tablecloths didn’t match, nor did the tables they covered, which came in assorted shapes and sizes. In fact, other than the centerpieces Regina rescued the night before, nothing matched, not chairs, plates, cutlery, glasses, or even the food. Had we ordered lasagna at a wedding hall, we would have gotten giant trays of the same bland noodles. Instead, I counted at least eight different lasagnas, dozens of pastas, and close to fifty salads. If anyone minded the lack of uniformity, they didn’t mention it to me. For I had found my match, both in the man sitting by my side and in the crowd of family and friends gathered to see us united.
So what if we danced on grass rather than parquet? I’d rather dance barefoot than in heels any day. So what if our wedding band had yet to sprout facial hair? They played their hearts out, and what they lacked in polish, they more than made up for in enthusiasm. So what if there’d be no pile of expensive gifts awaiting us? We’d received something far more precious from our guests: they’d given of themselves to make our wedding a reality.
Kyle rapped his glass twice more, this time amplified by the microphone. He cleared his throat and said, “I can read on all of your faces the joy, excitement, and gratitude you’ve felt throughout this wedding. But for my wife Libby and me, one emotion takes precedence over all others.”
Libby leaned into the microphone and said, “Relief.”
“We’ve been watching this long, drawn-out saga from day one. And let me tell you, it was not always pretty.”
As Kyle told the sordid details of my on-again off-again romance with Dylan, my mind wandered to some all-too-familiar ruminations. Since that fateful day I received Dylan’s letter, I’d repeatedly wondered where I’d gone wrong. Had I been wrong to wash my hands of him back in college? Wrong to walk out on him seven years later? Wrong to not drop everything and follow him to Ecuador?
I’d beaten myself up over my choices so many times. But now that the doubt and uncertainty were over, now that we were finally united, I wondered, had I gone wrong at all?
If I had been Dylan’s traveling buddy in Mexico instead of Kyle, perhaps things would have been different. Perhaps we could have come to one mind about our financial future. But Dylan was moved by Luther’s words, not me. He had to investigate the path that spoke to him, and I had to be true to my own journey. Despite spending plenty of money, my head was not in finances at the time. I was hardly thinking about making a living, much less saving for retirement.
Seven years later, I’d matured in many respects, but still not so much in the realm of money. Sure, I paid my bills and made my 401(k) contributions, but that was about it. I started learning about building a Cash Machine, not because I saw a need for it, but because Dylan valued it. I tried to play the role of the dutiful girlfriend. But that could only go so far.
My second go-around with Dylan can be summed up in one word: compromise. Dylan initially talked about compromising with me, but I feared asking him to. Instead, I compromised over and over again. I drove an ugly dented car and bought a terrifying house from a woman who looked more at home on a street corner than in a real estate office. And why? To show Dylan that I was ready to go with him on his journey. But one-sided compromise isn’t the foundation of a sustainable relationship. While everything Dylan told me made logical sense, it was still his journey, not mine. And forcing myself into a life I didn’t love, even for a man I did, just wasn’t tenable.
The part of the tale that wouldn’t make it into Kyle’s Best Man’s speech was that everything shifted when my father had his heart attack. That’s when all that information Dylan pumped into my head finally entered my heart. That’s when I took my first true step in Dylan’s direction. And I wasn’t the only one who shifted. As Dylan’s Cash Machine grew, he finally loosened his purse strings and moved towards me.
Had I learned more about money from the start, could we have made the relationship work a decade earlier? Perhaps. But that’s not where I was. It wasn’t who I was.
The crowd laughed, and I returned my attention to Kyle’s speech. “So a trip that began with my best friend and I traveling together ended with me coming home alone. But at least I didn’t return empty-handed. Oh, no, no, no. Like a modern-day version of the Pony Express, I came…bearing a letter.”
The table with my college friends laughed loudest at this. They remembered this part of the story far too well.
Libby took the mic from her husband. “Amber remains my best friend to this day, but admittedly, our conversations have lacked the pluck they had before I got married. We used to sit up for hours talking about boys. Now I’d spend half the time talking about dirty diapers. She was even worse, though. She’d spend the other half talking taxes!”
Vinny leaned in and whispered something in Maria Rose’s ear, no doubt bragging about how he’d set me straight on taxes. I could only see one of Vinny’s hands above the table, and I guessed the other rested on Maria Rose’s knee. I considered Vinny more than repaid for all the advice he’d given me over the years. A guy like Vinny needed a good Italian woman, and Maria Rose was certainly that.
I didn’t relate to Vinny’s vendetta against the IRS, but there was no question I respected his knowledge. I expected him to achieve levels of financial abundance in his lifetime far greater than anything Dylan and I would reach. Even so, I had no interest in walking his path. Dylan and I were financially free, meaning we now had enough passive income to support our family and build a life together without financial pressure. Working twice as hard for twice as much, or even ten times as much, had zero appeal for me. Vinny, on the other hand, would never stop. He’d never want to.
In thinking about all the people around me and all our journeys, it hit me how there was no singular path to financial success just as there was no singular path through life. Dylan wasn’t wrong for dropping out of college, nor was I wrong for staying in. Kyle wasn’t wrong for taking on massive educational debt, nor was Vinny wrong for maximizing tax benefits.
Still, that doesn’t mean all financial choices are created equal. It’s a little scary for me to remember that from leasing my first new car to renting my first one-bedroom apartment, I’d spent virtually zero time thinking about how these decisions would impact my financial future. I didn’t even have the tools to analyze the costs, so I mostly made the same choices as my equally clueless friends.
That was Dylan’s objection to school, not that it wasn’t right for anyone, but that he’d found himself on a path without knowing why he was on it, without understanding the costs involved, and without a clear vision of what he wanted to achieve at the end. Once he took time off to understand his options, he decided he’d be better off leaving school, but he could just as easily have decided otherwise.
There are literally millions of paths regarding money, and each of us can choose the one that appeals to us most. But to make responsible choices, we need financial literacy and education.
Kyle raised his champagne glass. “And so, after many years, many trials, and many tears, the saga of Amber and Dylan’s dating life has now, thankfully, come to an end. As you enter this next stage of your lives, may you continue to learn and grow together. I wish you a marriage filled with love, with happiness, with abundance.”
I took Dylan’s hand. No longer was I compromising for love. No longer was I on a blind path, hoping that if I followed the crowd, all would work out. I felt pure gratitude to finally be on my chosen path with my chosen man.
I want to bless you, Dear Reader, with success on your financial journey. If I’ve given you anything, I hope it’s insight into some of the obstacles and opportunities you’ll encounter as you forge ahead. Just know, this is not the end of your financial education. This book is not a blueprint for achieving wealth—it’s more like a treasure map. You’ll no doubt need more research before implementing these strategies, but I hope I’ve shown you where to dig.
My story is over, but this next leg of your financial journey is just beginning. Some paths you have to walk on your own, but remember, help is never far away. To continue your journey, find resources and courses at BuildMyCashMachine.com.
