Travis Watts Hudgens - Now: An Autobiography

NOW

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY

TRAVIS WATTS HUDGENS

iUniverse, Inc.

Bloomington

NOW

An Autobiography

Copyright 2013 by Travis Watts Hudgens.

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ISBN: 978-1-4759-7395-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4759-7396-9 (ebk)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013901855

iUniverse rev. date: 01/25/2013

Table of Contents

This book is dedicated to my family, and to everyone who has stuck by me while I have been going through these tough times. Its no masterpiece, just a little bit of whats going on inside my head.

I think that everyone who I have hurt deserves to know what Im thinking. Im also going to take this opportunity to apologize to all of them; you guys know who you are.

In my past I was selfish. Thats the only word I can come up with to describe it. Im sorry, and without you guys, I never would have made it. I love you all.

Travis

When I got the idea to write a book about myself, I figured it would serve multiple purposesfirst and foremost being a guide to my life. What I have done so far, what I plan to do, what I dream of doing. Choices Ive made both good and bad, hopefully to give me some idea as to why I make those choices. I heard a quote once, Fools only learn from their own mistakes. Wise men learn from others. When I heard that, I asked myselfthen what do we call people who dont even learn from their own mistakes? Sometimes I wonder where I stand in that analogy. I guess the future will decide. Another reason Im writing this book is for others, although Im not structuring this book in anyway as in making an outline, a format or brainstorming. Im hoping to give others a glimpse into my life however impressive or unimpressive it may be. I want people to understand why Im me. The way I see it, people make decisions about a person based on what they know, so before a person decides on me I want them to know. Now since Im just sort of flowing through this book I guess Ill start.

NOW

My name is Travis Watts Hudgens, son of the late Peter and of Amber Hudgens, who is now remarried and is Amber Morris. Brother to Paige Lobb and father to Jiovanni Aguilar. I am 25 years of age, and by the time this book is finished I will be 26.

My life so far has been good, and that line right there might confuse many, if not all, the people who know me. I have eight felony convictions, three unsuccessful trips to rehab, and have been a career criminal for the last ten years of my life. I have done terrible things to myself, to strangers, and even worse than that, to my family. Still, I consider that my life has been good. Now God has been responsible for all of that. And throughout it all Ive surfacednot unscathed, but surfaced none the less.

Now I want to get one thing straight right now: Im not writing this as a religious conversion book, but I am being real. So real people recognize real things, and if this book moves you, then ask yourself, why?

YOUTH

When I was young things were good. Just an average family living an average life. It was my mom, dad, sister and me. I played baseball, built forts with my friends, picked on my sister and loved my dog. Things were good.

But then I turned eight, and life happened. My dad started screwing the babysitter, selling drugs and arguing with my mom. I never saw him hit her, but one time I do remember him slapping some dishes out of her hand and pushing her. Things were just getting bad. I started finding drugs around the house, though I didnt know they were drugs at the time. I would move them from one place in the house and hide them in another. My dad started getting pissed when that happened. He would blame my mom, so I stopped doing that. Those were just some of the things I would be experiencing more and more of as I got older, teaching me that drugs destroy.

After some yearsIm not sure how manymy mom and dad split up. Dad went on to pursue a career in dope-dealing. Mom was left with the beautiful gift of raising two unruly children by herself. Im sure that the fact that the man shed loved and married, and who had fathered her two children, was unfaithful just added that much more to the joy of the experience.

Throughout the years my mom did her best to raise us kids. But I believe that she felt that having a man around the house would be better for us. Boys and girls do need dads, and mine was off concentrating on his own conquest of the drug world. My mom didnt have a lot of boyfriends as far as I can remember, but there was one that would leave a lasting impression on me to this day. His name was David. I was around nine when I met him, and I remember how he acted. He was unusually nice, and he smiled a lot. [But I was to find out later that this was a clever ruse by one of the most cowardly, self-centered pussies I would ever meet in my life]

Before I knew it, he had convinced my mom to relocate us kids from our grandmas house in Arizona to Missouri, where he had lived and had a lot of family. It didnt seem to be a bad idea. He was nice and after all my mom deserved it. She had been doing her best to keep a roof over our heads and give us the attention we needed. And at five and nine years of age, we needed a lot.

So my mom, my sister, David and I moved to Missouri or Misery, as Id heard my mom describe it before. I was in elementary school, my sister was in grade school. Things were good. Life seemed O.K., and I was adjusting well to my new surroundings. I still remember the name of one of my good buddies there, Paul Ziegler. Stuff was still all right at that point, and I was happy that my mom didnt have to be alone any more. I knew it had hurt her when my dad cheated on her.

Things were going the way they shoulduntil they werent. There is a clear memory in my mind of a lot of drinking going on at the time. I believe it was about then that I started on my personal mission to end it all. I dont know if it was just their drinking that upset me, or the fact that I associate it with their arguing and that coward David putting hands on my mom. I have a memory, and Im not sure if it has been hyped up by the fact that I was so young when it happened, of him slapping her and dumping a pitcher of Kool-Aid over her head. I tried to intervene, but he picked me up and threw me through an open window and onto the hood of the family car. Needless to say, Mr. David should hope that our paths dont cross again.

It wasnt long before my mom was smart enough to get herself and us kids out of there. We headed back on a road trip from the great state of Misery back to Grandmas. But not before we made one more stop, a stop that would change our lives forever... Dallas.

A MAN NAMED TEX

We arrived in Dallas at a good old outlaw relatives house. I was still young, maybe 11 or so, but by this time I had become well aware of what dope was, and that lady equaled dope. Not weed or pot or anything like that. I mean dope. I mean nine or ten people stopping by in an hour, trinkets and gizmos torn up everywhere, half motorbikes in the yard, up all hours of the night dope. But besides dope there was one more thing that caught my eye, and it caught my eye because it caught my moms eye. His name was Tex.