Some of the best people...

You don't have to know me very well to know that I am pretty melodramatic...with good cause. The story of my life is surely an interesting one with extreme highs and equally extreme lows. I was at a pretty low point emotionally in my early twenties. One night, in a stupor of loneliness, I decided to go and see my sister Barb at a roadhouse called O'Toole's where she was working as a bartender. I popped in, said "hello" and was headed for the door when her near-perfect sense of empathy prompted her to stop me. She insisted I pull up a seat at the bar and keep her company. This was clearly a gesture of generosity as she was in no need of me keeping her company with her regular customers surrounding the bar. She would serve them drinks as they ordered them and then promptly return to my end of the bar to chat and continue feeding me drinks on her tab. Barb has always been a knockout which I'm sure was much appreciated eye-candy to her regulars and obviously she normally spent more time chatting with them because as she went to the other end of the bar to serve one guy, he indignantly questioned her.
"Who's the punk at the other end of the bar that's getting all your attention tonight?" I didn't even flinch; I was emotionally in no place to give a rat's ass what some middle-aged bar regular thought about me, and without looking up, I continued nursing my current drink. Then something happened that surprised me. Barb had no idea that I was absorbing every word of this conversation and I was amazed to hear her response.
"Be careful what you say. That 'punk' has got more intelligence in his little finger than you and I put together. And don't talk about my brother that way." Then she walked away to continue her social time with me, much at the expense, I'm sure, of any tip he might have been planning to leave. To this day, Barb probably still doesn't know that I heard what she said. It is one of those memories to which I regularly return when I am in need of a little emotional reassurance. Sisters are some of the best people. Remember that.
See you in hell,
Shakes.