Tim and Stacy, with the brazen Little White Wedding Chapel sign looming large.
The last ESPN radio update I heard before shutting off the car and walking to Little White Wedding Chapel was that the Raiders were beating the Rams, 16-14.
The Raiders had to win Sunday, of all days, because this was the day Tim Foreman would be married.
Tim is a friend from long ago, from Chico. I met him when he was 13, I think, and I was 15. He was in seventh grade and I was in ninth, a wide chasm of maturity when you're young boys in junior high.
Tim became my younger brother's best friend. Over time we became close, too. My friends and my brother's younger clique all grew up together, essentially. Or maybe we just got older together. And we grew apart.
I had not seen Tim for many years, 20 at least. But we connected again through Facebook, and invariably anytime a Las Vegan connects with someone from his or her past in Facebook — be it an old schoolmate or long-lost fourth cousin — there can be a reunion in VegasVille.
So it was that Tim informed me, weeks ago, he would be married in Las Vegas at Charolette Richards' Matrimony Emporium. He'd seen the place featured on a Travel Chanel specials about Vegas weddings, a reminder that a lot of would-be Vegas tourists glean information about our city from Travel Channel. Talk to your family about the best places to eat in Las Vegas, and they'll tell you all about what they have learned about the city by watching the Travel Chanel: "Oh yeah, I saw on the Travel Channel where Wolfgang Puck owns, like, a dozen restaurants there."
Surely, Travel Chanel still is noting the rich and famous who have wed at Little White Chapel, such marquee names as Michael Jordan and Joan Collins. Mickey Rooney, too, though as someone waiting in the chapel's lobby noted, "Who remembers Mickey Rooney anymore?"
Tim showed up, well-suited and eyes glistening, and I didn't exactly know what to expect. He's bald, having shaved his head, and looked equal parts sinister and dapper. We hugged. He thanked me for being there. I gave him the, "It's in the neighborhood," line.
We had no time, really, to catch up. This was his wedding day, and the chapel lobby was stuffed with about 30 guests, for his and a couple of other services on a busy Sunday afternoon. But he hit on the nostalgic moments as if they were talking points.
"Remember the riots during Pioneer Week?" he asked, summoning memories of a pretty terrible ending to Chico's civic and university celebration. "There was a couch on Fifth and Ivy, and everyone was chanting 'Burn it! Burn it!'"
"Oh, it got burned," I said. "So did everything else on that corner. I was at work at the Enterprise-Record the next morning at about 6, and a guy walked in who had passed out and been branded."
"Yeah! The branding! I remember that," Tim said. "The big 'C' on his shoulder."
There was an Ozzy Osbourne concert in Sacramento he fondly recalled. "We drove down in your Cougar ..."
"... and Vixen opened! Vixen! We paid to see Vixen!"
"A lot of A's games."
"Oh man, tons."
"The night they clinched the AL West against the Twins."
"We were in the bleachers! We heckled Kirby Puckett all night!"
Tubing down the Sacramento River. Playing Wiffle Ball in our neighborhood cul-de-sac at our. Buying title fights on pay-per-view and hosting rowdy parties where Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and Crown Royal were the libations of choice.
We covered a lot of memories so fast it was hard not to feel dizzy. I met Stacy, the bride-to-be, and learned the family is living in Klamath Falls now. Tim is an assistant manager of a Staples there. He has sons ages 17, 13 and 15 months. The two older boys remind me so much of him. I couldn't resist saying, "We got in a lot of trouble when we were your age." I felt like a long-lost uncle.
Just before he took his position to walk up the aisle, I asked Tim, "Did the Raiders win?"
He smiled and said, "Oh, yeah. They pulled it out."
"It's a day for a commitment to excellence then!" I said.
"Totally!" he said. There was a time we'd high-five at that, but today it's a fist-bump and a very Vegas moment.
Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at twitter.com/JohnnyKats.
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