I've had some terrible jobs, but working in a kitchen at Cracker Barrel is probably the worst I've ever had. I was a grill cook - awful! It wasn't the smell, it was the people. The music, too. We had to be 'country fresh,' so they played this terrible country music eight hours during the shift. It was a bleak existence - a very dark time.
In a dark time, the eye begins to see.
I had a really dark time after the Olympic Games... But then I said to myself, 'This is a sport that's blessed me with a home, with an education, with some money. I can't hate this sport. This sport took me out of Louisiana. This sport gave me a chance when so many people don't get a chance. And I love this sport.'
I guess 16, 17, 18, that whole period was a dark time for me. I guess it was a hormonal thing, going through all those changes as a young woman, learning who you are and being comfortable with yourself, and also, which goes along with that, boys. It was definitely an unhappy, 'Who am I?' period. 'Who am I gonna be?'
There's also some element of coming of age during the Reagan administration, which everybody has painted as some glorious time in America, but I remember as being a very, very dark time. There was apocalypse in the air; the punk rock movement made sense.
All I can do with my music is try and be a light for people who are in a dark time.
Around 10, I got chubby. I knew I'd crossed a line when the only pants that fit were from the 'Junior Plenty' line at JC Penny. My parents had split up, my mom was going through a dark time, and my brother and I were getting bullied in our new neighborhood. Life was big and unsafe.
My whole life, baseball was my first love. I was gonna go play college, but during my senior year I tore my ACL, and college kind of faded away with their offer, which I understand, obviously. That was a dark time in my life.
I did go through a bit of a dark time during the years I was trying to be a mom. But I'm basically a very positive person.
I'm a creative person who had a lot of dark time in my life. I can still get to it: I can still go to a relationship or a time when things weren't great. But it's getting further and further from me.
