You stand with the least likely to succeed until success is succeeded by something more valuable: kinship. You stand with the belligerent, the surly and the badly behaved until bad behavior is recognized for the language it is: the vocabulary of the deeply wounded and of those whose burdens are more than they can bear.

I was kind of like the Rhea Perlman of the bar. I was like Carla on 'Cheers.' People were more afraid of me. There was a point where I got a little surly. There were only so many chicken wings I could serve before losing the smile on my face.

I was never one of those surly teenagers who doesn't smile. My lovely godfather said it was always lovely to see me because I was the only teenager who smiled. And I was so in awe of him, I thought it was one of the best things anyone had ever said to me. So it made me want to live up to what he said.