Latest / QUESTION EVERYTHING / The Magic Is in the Work You’re Avoiding: with Restaurateur Kevin Boehm

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The Magic Is in the Work You’re Avoiding: with Restaurateur Kevin Boehm · QUESTION EVERYTHING

0:03
Speaker 1: No one has all the answers, but when we ask
0:05
Speaker 1: the right questions, we get a little closer, closer to truths,
0:11
Speaker 1: closer to each other, even closer to ourselves. I'm journalist
0:16
Speaker 1: Danielle Robe, and each week, my guests and I come
0:19
Speaker 1: together to challenge the status quo and our own ways
0:22
Speaker 1: of thinking by daring to ask what if, why not?
0:28
Speaker 1: And who says? So? Come curious, dig deep, and join
0:33
Speaker 1: the conversation. It's time to question everything. Today is a lore.
0:41
Speaker 1: It is a lore, It is a saga. It is
0:43
Speaker 1: a story of all stories. I'm gonna jump right into
0:47
Speaker 1: this one because some people carry their stories quietly, they
0:51
Speaker 1: move through the world without revealing the battles that they've fought.
0:55
Speaker 1: But Kevin Bame is not one of those people. He
1:01
Speaker 1: has lived loudly or relentlessly on fire for a long time,
1:06
Speaker 1: almost no one knew what it was really costing him.
1:09
Speaker 1: And now he's telling the truth, the whole truth, in
1:12
Speaker 1: his new memoir The Bottomless Cup. Kevin is one of
1:15
Speaker 1: the most celebrated restaurant tours in America, forty six restaurants,
1:18
Speaker 1: a James Beard Award, and a life built around hospitality.
1:22
Speaker 1: And when I say hospitality. He eats, sleeps, and breathes it.
1:27
Speaker 1: I love the way he talks about it. It's all
1:29
Speaker 1: about making other people feel seen and celebrated and cared for.
1:32
Speaker 1: But Kevin learned how to build joy in a room
1:35
Speaker 1: long before he even knew what it was like to
1:37
Speaker 1: feel it himself. He grew up in a home where
1:39
Speaker 1: love felt conditional. His dad called him an idiot, a loser,
1:43
Speaker 1: but at eighteen, everything he thought he knew about himself detonated.
1:48
Speaker 1: Three years before leaving for college, Kevin's biological father, a
1:51
Speaker 1: man he didn't know existed, showed up and shared the
1:54
Speaker 1: truth with him that his mom had an affair, and
1:57
Speaker 1: that guy who he thought was his father, the one
2:00
Speaker 1: who despised him, was not his dad. In that moment,
2:04
Speaker 1: the ground beneath him gave out. The story he'd been
2:06
Speaker 1: telling himself about family and love and identity cracked wide open.
2:11
Speaker 1: So he did what he'd been trained to do. He reinvented.
2:14
Speaker 2: When you feel like someone who's despised in your own home,
2:18
Speaker 2: when you're growing up, you kind of feel like the
2:21
Speaker 2: only way that you can be loved is out of invention,
2:25
Speaker 2: And so I created this sort of avatar very.
2:29
Speaker 1: Early on, he lied his way into his first restaurant job.
2:32
Speaker 1: He wrote a fake resume, and he never stopped running.
2:36
Speaker 1: By twenty one, he owned his first cafe. By thirty,
2:38
Speaker 1: he was building the kind of restaurants where people fell
2:41
Speaker 1: in love, proposed, grieved, and celebrated. But behind the success
2:46
Speaker 1: was a man sprinting from the truth. And you know
2:49
Speaker 1: what they say, when you run from yourself, eventually you
2:53
Speaker 1: run into yourself. So when COVID hit, when Kevin's mom died,
2:56
Speaker 1: when his marriage cracked, and the restaurant industry collapse, he
3:00
Speaker 1: ended up alone on a ledge in Los Angeles, hung over, heartbroken,
3:06
Speaker 1: and just as he decided he was going to jump
3:09
Speaker 1: the phone ring, a single call saved his life. That
3:12
Speaker 1: was his real rock bottom, and after that day he rebuilt,
3:17
Speaker 1: not the restaurants himself.
3:20
Speaker 2: Everyone is responsible, but no one is to blame.
3:23
Speaker 1: Kevin stopped drinking, He started writing his book. He went
3:26
Speaker 1: to therapy and Hoffman, he faced his bipolar disorder. After
3:30
Speaker 1: twenty three years of denial, he forgave people who hurt him,
3:33
Speaker 1: and he learned what real happiness felt like. Not the mannic, fast,
3:38
Speaker 1: glittering kind, but the quiet kind. So the question we're
3:42
Speaker 1: circling today is how do you stop being the version
3:45
Speaker 1: of yourself you invented to survive and become the person
3:48
Speaker 1: you actually are, even if it costs you your old life.
3:52
Speaker 1: It's time to question everything. With Kevin Baine, Kevin, your
3:59
Speaker 1: story is wild. I get to hear a lot of
4:02
Speaker 1: stories in what I do and your book it takes
4:06
Speaker 1: you on so many twists and turns. I felt like
4:09
Speaker 1: I was reading a screenplay. If Your Life was a movie,
4:12
Speaker 1: what would the logline be?
4:14
Speaker 2: Miles Davis has one of my favorite quotes, which is,
4:17
Speaker 2: it took me years to learn to play like myself.
4:20
Speaker 2: So maybe it took him years to learn to play
4:22
Speaker 2: like himself because a I had a real identity crisis
4:27
Speaker 2: early on. I grew up not understanding why my father
4:32
Speaker 2: hated me so much, and at eighteen I figured out why.
4:36
Speaker 1: So I want to start with the title of your memoir,
4:38
Speaker 1: it's the Bottomless Cup. It sounds like you spent almost
4:41
Speaker 1: your entire life up until a few years ago searching
4:45
Speaker 1: how to fill it. What was in your cup or
4:48
Speaker 1: what wasn't in your cup at the beginning?
4:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I've been a seeker for a long time.
4:52
Speaker 2: Because when you feel like someone who's despised in your
4:56
Speaker 2: own home, when you're growing up, you kind of feel
4:59
Speaker 2: like the the only way that you can be loved
5:02
Speaker 2: is out of invention. And so I created this sort
5:06
Speaker 2: of avatar very early on. If you do that long enough,
5:10
Speaker 2: you end up becoming a stranger to yourself. And so
5:13
Speaker 2: as I was on that search for who I was,
5:16
Speaker 2: I figured out that manic moments gave me dopamine, and
5:21
Speaker 2: so when I wanted to fill my cup up, I
5:23
Speaker 2: would have these grand gestures of these big moments, and
5:26
Speaker 2: I thought that was happiness. So I dropped out of
5:29
Speaker 2: school when I was nineteen years old and ended up
5:33
Speaker 2: living in my car and the panhandle of Florida, and
5:37
Speaker 2: I wrote this really beautiful piece of fiction which was
5:40
Speaker 2: my first resume, which had all these restaurants on it
5:44
Speaker 2: that no one could call for a reference check because
5:46
Speaker 2: they had all mysteriously gone out of business. So I
5:49
Speaker 2: walked my way into this job, and instantly that rush
5:55
Speaker 2: of a busy dining room gave me a rush. And
5:59
Speaker 2: so I figured out was you know what, I could
6:02
Speaker 2: do this every night and it could be mine. I'm
6:04
Speaker 2: going to throw a party every single night, we're going
6:07
Speaker 2: to clean it up. Then we're going to set it
6:09
Speaker 2: back up again and do it the next day. And
6:11
Speaker 2: I was going to be a party thrower so I
6:13
Speaker 2: could constantly have this rush of dopamine. And in the
6:16
Speaker 2: beginning that worked, but I mistook manic moments for happy moments.
6:22
Speaker 1: Well, fast forward. You've been incredibly successful in the hospitality industry.
6:26
Speaker 1: How many restaurants have you opened?
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Speaker 2: Forty six in counting in counting.
6:31
Speaker 1: You've also been candid that a lot of that success
6:34
Speaker 1: came from that frenzied high that you're talking about. Why
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Speaker 1: did you decide that now was the right time to
6:40
Speaker 1: write this book and talk about all the high and
6:43
Speaker 1: low moments.
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Speaker 2: First of all, rock bottom is a gift. It is
6:48
Speaker 2: if you survive it. And so there's a million people
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Speaker 2: who are rock bottom and there is no survival, and
6:54
Speaker 2: that goes for depression, it goes for addiction. And for myself,
7:00
Speaker 2: when I survived the lowest of the lows and came
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Speaker 2: out of it, I felt like I had kind of
7:05
Speaker 2: a free spin. I was like, Okay, death is the
7:08
Speaker 2: other side of this. Then I'm going to throw the
7:09
Speaker 2: kitchen sink at happiness and try to write the ship,
7:13
Speaker 2: and when I did, I was like, you know what,
7:15
Speaker 2: I'm comfortable with sharing this story now. And for some reason,
7:19
Speaker 2: I always thought the story was going to hurt my
7:23
Speaker 2: image in some way, this carefully crafted avatar that I
7:27
Speaker 2: had tried to create, which included at times me having
7:31
Speaker 2: a happy childhood. And so now I don't give a
7:34
Speaker 2: shit about the Fugaci part of me that he used
7:37
Speaker 2: to be out there. I'm more concerned at the real me.
7:40
Speaker 2: I'm more excited to put the story out there and
7:42
Speaker 2: say this is actually who I am.
7:44
Speaker 1: You decided to write a piece right after your mom
7:47
Speaker 1: passed away. Was there permission there to sort of put
7:51
Speaker 1: your story out there.
7:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good way of putting it a little bit.
7:55
Speaker 2: And even though that story didn't delve into everything. My
7:58
Speaker 2: mom passed away the day before restaurants closed for COVID.
8:02
Speaker 2: So if you think of two of the only anchors
8:05
Speaker 2: in my life my mom and restaurants, both of them
8:09
Speaker 2: went away in a very short amount of time. So
8:12
Speaker 2: the next day we couldn't throw a funeral for her
8:15
Speaker 2: because of COVID. We had a dinner at a restaurant
8:18
Speaker 2: that I had in Springfullinois together and then I had
8:20
Speaker 2: to drive up to Chicago the next day and close
8:23
Speaker 2: down all my restaurants, so I didn't really sleep for
8:27
Speaker 2: like two or three days, and within my insomni, I
8:29
Speaker 2: woke up and wrote this piece about her, and I
8:32
Speaker 2: sent it to my publicist, who was also a close friend,
8:35
Speaker 2: and she was just like, hey, do you mind if
8:37
Speaker 2: I send this to Esquire? And Esquire ended up printing it,
8:40
Speaker 2: which sort of led to the book. And so there
8:43
Speaker 2: was truth in the story that I wrote, but I
8:46
Speaker 2: left a lot of parts out. And when a book
8:49
Speaker 2: agent saw that story and complimented me on it, he
8:52
Speaker 2: kind of said, hey, pitch me some ideas for a book,
8:55
Speaker 2: and I pitched him three or four, none of which
8:58
Speaker 2: he cared for, and then he said anything else, and
9:01
Speaker 2: I said, yeah, I have something, but it's pretty personal.
9:04
Speaker 2: And it was one of the first times, maybe the
9:06
Speaker 2: first time I had ever told my full story to
9:08
Speaker 2: a stranger.
9:09
Speaker 1: How did he react?
9:10
Speaker 2: He said, that's the book.
9:11
Speaker 1: That's the book.
9:13
Speaker 2: I don't even think I got it all out. He goes,
9:15
Speaker 2: this is the book.
9:16
Speaker 1: So we've been kind of talking around it. We mentioned
9:19
Speaker 1: avatar pain, your mother, your father, hating you. Can you
9:24
Speaker 1: start from the beginning sure, and just kind of share
9:27
Speaker 1: the broad strokes.
9:28
Speaker 2: My mom was one of fourteen kids who grew up
9:32
Speaker 2: on a farm in ross Common, Michigan. She was farm
9:34
Speaker 2: labor at age six, beaten by her dad at times,
9:38
Speaker 2: sexually abused by a relative. Horrific childhood by any standard,
9:43
Speaker 2: got away to high school and said, I'm going to
9:46
Speaker 2: be valedictorian this high school. I'm going to get a
9:48
Speaker 2: free ride to college, and I'm never going to come
9:50
Speaker 2: back to ross Common, Michigan. That's what she did. She
9:53
Speaker 2: got a free d to Central Michigan University. She's very pretty.
9:57
Speaker 2: She sits down the cafeteria that first week and she goes,
10:00
Speaker 2: I'm gonna marry the first nice guy that I meet.
10:02
Speaker 2: Guy sits down next to her in the cafeteria. Four
10:05
Speaker 2: months later, she's married to him. On her wedding night,
10:08
Speaker 2: he's screaming at her and she's like, oh crap, I
10:12
Speaker 2: don't even know this guy. So they have a daughter.
10:15
Speaker 2: She's miserable, and she just thinks, man, these are the
10:19
Speaker 2: cards I've been dealt in life. Maybe happiness for me
10:23
Speaker 2: is not a worldly possession. Maybe I'm gonna inherit it
10:26
Speaker 2: later in the afterlife, she answers an ad in the
10:29
Speaker 2: newspaper to write speeches and book travel for an ex
10:34
Speaker 2: professional boxer who had become a motivational speaker. He's fifty one,
10:38
Speaker 2: she's twenty four. He's wildly charismatic, he's good looking, and
10:42
Speaker 2: they have an affair. She gets pregnant. She goes back
10:45
Speaker 2: to the man she's married to and says, I'm gonna
10:48
Speaker 2: leave you, and he instantly says, if you leave me,
10:51
Speaker 2: I'll kill myself. Protestant gil gets the best of her
10:54
Speaker 2: and she stays. Three months later, she's noticeably pregnant, and
10:59
Speaker 2: they don't say a word about the origin of that baby,
11:02
Speaker 2: even though he must know it's not his because they
11:05
Speaker 2: haven't been together in a long, long time. So the
11:08
Speaker 2: baby comes out. His name fraudulently goes on the pertificate
11:11
Speaker 2: that's me, You're the baby. I'm the baby. So as
11:14
Speaker 2: soon as I come out, all he sees is that man.
11:19
Speaker 2: And so what he looks at me, he doesn't see
11:20
Speaker 2: a son. He sees an enemy. He sees somebody who
11:24
Speaker 2: ruined his life. And I pretty much felt that all
11:28
Speaker 2: the time. So you're a young kid, and all you
11:31
Speaker 2: want your dad to do is love you. Be proud
11:34
Speaker 2: of you. And I just always knew he had a
11:38
Speaker 2: real problem with me.
11:40
Speaker 1: How did you know?
11:41
Speaker 2: Well, first of all, he wasn't shy about it. He
11:43
Speaker 2: would tell me that I was an idiot and a
11:46
Speaker 2: loser pretty much constantly. I remember a moment where I
11:51
Speaker 2: thought I'd solved it. I was watching Little House on
11:54
Speaker 2: the Prairie and Charles Ingalls was swinging an axe and
11:57
Speaker 2: my dad was like, you know what, I need an
11:59
Speaker 2: ad because we got to chop down that willow tree
12:01
Speaker 2: that had died in our backyard. And I went to
12:04
Speaker 2: Mom and I go, Mom, I know what I'm going
12:05
Speaker 2: to get Dad for Christmas. I'm going to get him
12:08
Speaker 2: an ax. This is like my pressient hospitality skills very
12:11
Speaker 2: early in life. And she's like, that's a great idea.
12:14
Speaker 2: We go to Sears and we buy him an axe.
12:16
Speaker 2: And you know when you wrap something like an axe,
12:18
Speaker 2: you can already tell it's an axe. Yeah, it's under
12:20
Speaker 2: the tree and he opens it and he was actually, hey,
12:23
Speaker 2: thank you, this is really great, and I'm like, that's all.
12:27
Speaker 2: It took an eight dollars ax from Sears and I
12:29
Speaker 2: have solved our relationship. And I was so happy that
12:33
Speaker 2: I made him happy that I kept bringing it up,
12:35
Speaker 2: like you really like it, And at one point he
12:37
Speaker 2: was just like enough, you know, you're going to make
12:40
Speaker 2: your sister feel bad about her gift. And it quickly
12:43
Speaker 2: just turned and I knew very loud there was gonna
12:46
Speaker 2: be no way that I was going to make this
12:47
Speaker 2: guy happy. And so at a certain point we were
12:51
Speaker 2: just sworn enemies.
12:52
Speaker 1: And your mom never said a word to you, never.
12:54
Speaker 2: Said a word to me when we talked about it later,
12:57
Speaker 2: and she was right. She was like, I was just
12:59
Speaker 2: afraid if I told you there was going to be
13:01
Speaker 2: this moment where you're going to be like, well, oh yeah,
13:03
Speaker 2: well you're not my father, and she was dead I'm right,
13:06
Speaker 2: and she was just trying to keep the peace the
13:07
Speaker 2: best she could.
13:09
Speaker 1: Fast forward, you're nineteen and you have this job for
13:13
Speaker 1: the first time, and how are you feeling about yourself?
13:16
Speaker 2: Well, something had happened a year before that. You know,
13:19
Speaker 2: three days before I left to go to college. My
13:21
Speaker 2: real father had come and found me and taken me
13:25
Speaker 2: out to breakfast, and it said, your whole childhood's a lie.
13:30
Speaker 2: You know, I know from your mom that you'd never
13:31
Speaker 2: cared for your father much so perhaps it helps you
13:34
Speaker 2: to know that I'm your father.
13:36
Speaker 1: Do you remember that moment sort vividly?
13:39
Speaker 2: I remember how uncomfortable it was, because instantly what you're
13:42
Speaker 2: doing is you're rewinding, and you're thinking, oh, crap, this
13:46
Speaker 2: is why you hated me. And I can't believe my
13:49
Speaker 2: mom didn't tell me. And how am I supposed to feel?
13:51
Speaker 2: Now this guy's a stranger to me. I feel awkward
13:53
Speaker 2: around him. And so at that moment where the beads
13:56
Speaker 2: of sweat start coming down your face, I was in
13:59
Speaker 2: a full flop sweat and probably within like five minutes,
14:03
Speaker 2: red face, red neck. And I remember the server coming
14:07
Speaker 2: over and she's just normally doing your job. Can I
14:08
Speaker 2: get you more water? And I was like, well, somebody
14:10
Speaker 2: take me home. I need to go home. And he
14:13
Speaker 2: was like, are you sure? Can we talk about this,
14:15
Speaker 2: It's like, no, take me home, and so I just
14:17
Speaker 2: wanted to be alone. So he dropped me off in
14:19
Speaker 2: my car. I literally ran to my grade school parking
14:22
Speaker 2: lot for an hour and a half. I knew what
14:24
Speaker 2: time it was, and I knew Larry, who raised me,
14:26
Speaker 2: was at the house because he always came home for lunch.
14:29
Speaker 2: So I just had to sit and wait it out
14:31
Speaker 2: in the parking lot by myself, and just like, think
14:33
Speaker 2: about all this stuff.
14:35
Speaker 1: Being alone in a parking lot is really depressing. Imagery
14:39
Speaker 1: did it feel as depressing it did?
14:41
Speaker 2: I was just trying to figure it all out. My
14:43
Speaker 2: mom had always been my hero parent, and so to
14:46
Speaker 2: feel like I'd been betrayed by her then threw my
14:50
Speaker 2: whole life out of whack. And what it did was
14:55
Speaker 2: it turned me pretty rebellious for a little while, because
14:59
Speaker 2: I was like, well, you know what, fuck everybody. And
15:02
Speaker 2: I was so happy that I was leaving. Those three
15:05
Speaker 2: days in between that moment and leaving for school couldn't
15:07
Speaker 2: happen fast enough. I was just scarce those last three days,
15:12
Speaker 2: and I drove myself to college. My folks didn't come
15:14
Speaker 2: up with me, and I was gone, and I was like,
15:16
Speaker 2: get me out of here.
15:18
Speaker 1: Sometimes in memoirs, when people write about their childhood, I'm like,
15:22
Speaker 1: want to fast forward to the next part. Not your book.
15:25
Speaker 1: You write about your childhood so vividly. What was the
15:29
Speaker 1: earliest seat of the person you became.
15:31
Speaker 2: I wanted peace in my house. I was a peacemaker,
15:36
Speaker 2: and I liked to have a good time, and I
15:39
Speaker 2: liked making people happy. And my house was the exact
15:41
Speaker 2: opposite of that, and it was also seven hundred square
15:44
Speaker 2: feet with a bunch of hard services. There was this
15:47
Speaker 2: cacophony of arguing and consternation constantly, and I knew that
15:53
Speaker 2: once people had food in their mouths and drinks on
15:57
Speaker 2: the table, that everybody would shut the hell up. Oh wow,
16:01
Speaker 2: And so it would be like an argument would start
16:03
Speaker 2: between my mom and my dad or me, and I'd
16:06
Speaker 2: be like, hey, time, let's go, let's get some stuff
16:09
Speaker 2: on the table.
16:10
Speaker 1: Time for lasagna, talk for lasagna.
16:12
Speaker 2: And I would help in the kitchen and I would
16:13
Speaker 2: just try to separate people and get to the dinner table.
16:16
Speaker 2: And my our dinner tables were pretty quiet, people just
16:19
Speaker 2: eating as fast as they could. And I knew as
16:21
Speaker 2: soon as I got done with that, I washed the
16:23
Speaker 2: dishes and then I got out of there. So those
16:26
Speaker 2: seemed to be the most peaceful moments when we were
16:27
Speaker 2: sitting in a dining room table.
16:29
Speaker 1: Selling tomatoes door to door. You built fake restaurants with
16:33
Speaker 1: your sister. Take me back to your very first cup
16:37
Speaker 1: of coffee. How old were you when you had it
16:40
Speaker 1: first cup of coffee?
16:41
Speaker 2: Yeah? I was fourteen or fifteen years old. I was
16:44
Speaker 2: intrigued by flavors of all types. So if I saw
16:48
Speaker 2: adults doing it, I wanted to try it and see
16:51
Speaker 2: what it was. And so you also get a nice
16:53
Speaker 2: buzz of caffeine. I didn't need any more energy than
16:56
Speaker 2: I already had, but that really put me over the top.
16:58
Speaker 2: So I was so fast by things that wealthy people did.
17:03
Speaker 2: I would watch Dynasty and I'd be like, why is
17:06
Speaker 2: Alexus Carrington so fascinated with this caveat? What does it
17:10
Speaker 2: do to people when they put it in their mouths?
17:12
Speaker 2: You know? And so yeah, food was even though we
17:16
Speaker 2: weren't eating fancy food. My mom had been a farmer
17:21
Speaker 2: and we had a garden plot that the city of
17:24
Speaker 2: Springfield donated this part of land out. I sing them
17:28
Speaker 2: in State University where you could have your own garden
17:30
Speaker 2: plot for free, and my mom let me grow whatever
17:33
Speaker 2: I wanted to grow. So I grew tomatoes. And because
17:36
Speaker 2: we didn't have a lot of money is chili bowl
17:38
Speaker 2: haircuts and bad jeans and hand me down goodwill clothes,
17:42
Speaker 2: I was like, I'm going to sell these tomatoes ten cents,
17:46
Speaker 2: fifteen cents, twenty cents, twenty five cents, there's a picture
17:48
Speaker 2: in the book of me sitting at the end of
17:50
Speaker 2: my driveway, and the first time I ever sold tomatoes,
17:53
Speaker 2: I made ten bucks and I was like, Mom, you're
17:55
Speaker 2: not cutting my hair anymore. I'm going to the hair affair.
17:59
Speaker 2: I'm getting a proper haircut.
18:00
Speaker 1: You knew it was a bad haircut.
18:02
Speaker 2: I knew it was bad haircut because I was getting teased.
18:04
Speaker 2: So there's this moment in my life where I'm not
18:07
Speaker 2: popular in my home. I'm not popular at school. And
18:11
Speaker 2: one of the things that I knew that I could
18:13
Speaker 2: do to change that was my own industriousness. So I
18:16
Speaker 2: got a paper route, I sold tomatoes, working at Harty's
18:20
Speaker 2: when I was fifteen years old. I always had a job,
18:23
Speaker 2: and I always had cash in my pocket. All the
18:26
Speaker 2: way up to when I was eighteen years old, I
18:28
Speaker 2: was the kid with the fake id going to get
18:30
Speaker 2: kegs and throwing the keg parties, and my cake parties
18:33
Speaker 2: were organized. Man. I had initials on the bottoms of
18:36
Speaker 2: my solo cups, so somebody would show up with their
18:39
Speaker 2: own solo cup and I'm like, huh, Scott, I don't
18:41
Speaker 2: remember you buying a cup for me. Let me see
18:43
Speaker 2: the bottom of that cup.
18:44
Speaker 1: Huh.
18:45
Speaker 2: Maybe, like, sorry, bro, here's three bucks. If I had
18:48
Speaker 2: money in my pocket, to me, that equaled freedom. And
18:52
Speaker 2: I didn't like being poor. I didn't like not having
18:54
Speaker 2: any money. It made me feel trapped. And to this day,
18:58
Speaker 2: the jailed me bad me. And So if you want
19:02
Speaker 2: to look at why I was such a nomad when
19:04
Speaker 2: I was a kid, why I opened up my own business,
19:06
Speaker 2: why I didn't want to work for anybody, it all
19:08
Speaker 2: comes from these patterns that were built by that childhood.
19:21
Speaker 1: How long did you feel like that kid with bad
19:25
Speaker 1: jeans and a bad haircut?
19:27
Speaker 2: I mean, a little bit that always existed. But then
19:29
Speaker 2: there's a moment when you know, you get to go
19:33
Speaker 2: out a date with a pretty girl and you're like, Okay,
19:34
Speaker 2: maybe I've turned the tide a little bit. We were
19:39
Speaker 2: kissing a very pretty girl in high school and say, hey,
19:42
Speaker 2: maybe things have changed a little bit.
19:44
Speaker 1: Maybe I threw on a pair of Levi's and made
19:46
Speaker 1: it all that.
19:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, Levi's and that haircut made it all better. That's fascinating.
19:50
Speaker 2: I'm still the same kid.
19:51
Speaker 1: The book reveals that your entire identity was built around
19:55
Speaker 1: this avatar that you made up to outrun the truth
19:58
Speaker 1: of your childhood. You mentioned it earlier. Can you paint
20:02
Speaker 1: me a picture of who that avatar was? Because I
20:04
Speaker 1: get this very clear picture of who that kid Kevin was.
20:07
Speaker 2: I'll tell you an embarrassing story that's not in the book.
20:10
Speaker 2: Somebody from my fraternity a college happened to be in
20:13
Speaker 2: my hometown and we went out. Instead of having him
20:17
Speaker 2: drop me off at my little, tiny house, I had
20:20
Speaker 2: him drop me off at a house that was a
20:22
Speaker 2: blockover that was bigger. Because I had created this whole
20:25
Speaker 2: thing about.
20:26
Speaker 1: Who I was, and you told people's stories in college.
20:29
Speaker 2: In college, there was no mention of like me hating
20:32
Speaker 2: my dad or what happened, or my father not being
20:35
Speaker 2: my father or anything like that. I wanted to be
20:37
Speaker 2: a very normal kid. I'm a kid, parents were successful.
20:40
Speaker 2: Here's who I am. My fraternity specifically, was filled with
20:44
Speaker 2: people that were very successful and knew exactly who they
20:47
Speaker 2: wanted to be, which made me feel even worse about myself,
20:52
Speaker 2: which probably ultimately led to me dropping out. One of
20:55
Speaker 2: my housemates at school is one of the most successful
20:58
Speaker 2: astronauts in history. So I remember meeting him, and you know,
21:02
Speaker 2: he was an aeronautical engineering major and I'm like, yea,
21:05
Speaker 2: well what are you going to do? And he's like,
21:06
Speaker 2: I'm going to be an astronaut and you're like whatever.
21:10
Speaker 2: There's been four hundred of those, right, And one night
21:14
Speaker 2: another one of my housemates was asking. He's like, you're
21:18
Speaker 2: pre law He does, I don't think you're a lawyer, man,
21:21
Speaker 2: and I was like, I think you're right. I don't
21:23
Speaker 2: think I am either. He's like, well, why are you
21:25
Speaker 2: doing that? Fear disguised his practicality, and he goes, what
21:29
Speaker 2: do you really want to do? And I was like, man,
21:31
Speaker 2: that's kind of cheesy, and he's like, what is it.
21:33
Speaker 2: I was like, I want to own my own restaurant,
21:36
Speaker 2: and he goes, why aren't you doing that? I go,
21:39
Speaker 2: no money, I don't know anybody just doesn't seem realistic,
21:42
Speaker 2: and he goes, Kevin, Mike thinks he's going to be
21:45
Speaker 2: an astronaut. Touche. Yeah, but there are people at my
21:49
Speaker 2: school that were dreamers, who were already manifesting who they
21:54
Speaker 2: wanted to be, and that type of behavior is contagious,
21:57
Speaker 2: and so I was thinking maybe I can drop out.
22:01
Speaker 2: And at a certain point, my real father was coming
22:05
Speaker 2: up to the University of Illinois and he would just
22:08
Speaker 2: show up. I would get out of class and he
22:11
Speaker 2: would be sitting there like on a park bench. And
22:14
Speaker 2: then my mom took a job in the same town
22:17
Speaker 2: that I went to school. I was commuting from Springfield
22:20
Speaker 2: to Champagne and my father who raised me, Larry, was
22:25
Speaker 2: also coming up there. And at one point I had
22:27
Speaker 2: almost exploded, and I just one day took off. I
22:32
Speaker 2: was like, that's enough.
22:33
Speaker 1: How do you make sense of all three of them?
22:35
Speaker 1: Kind of checking in on you, especially Larry like Doude,
22:38
Speaker 1: you hated me my whole life.
22:39
Speaker 2: Larry was regretful. My mom adored me what he was regretful,
22:44
Speaker 2: what he was getting older and knew that he had
22:48
Speaker 2: watched me from a distance all these years. It must
22:51
Speaker 2: have been hard on him. And now he wanted me
22:53
Speaker 2: to just instantly feel like he was my father.
22:57
Speaker 1: Did you look like him?
22:58
Speaker 2: I did, but I couldn't up the switch of just
23:02
Speaker 2: loving him. And with Larry, he was too far gone.
23:06
Speaker 2: Once you go through the things that I had gone
23:08
Speaker 2: through with him. You know, this is a guy that
23:10
Speaker 2: hit me in the face when I was eight years old.
23:12
Speaker 2: There was no going back with him. Maybe someday I
23:15
Speaker 2: could find something with him, but our relationship for all
23:17
Speaker 2: intentsive purposes at that point was dead. And as much
23:20
Speaker 2: as I loved my mom, I felt suffocated. And I
23:26
Speaker 2: just got to the point where I was like, Man,
23:27
Speaker 2: I'm going to go all in on me whoever this
23:30
Speaker 2: new me is. I'm going to create this new me
23:32
Speaker 2: that doesn't have to deal with all of this baggage.
23:35
Speaker 2: And so all I wanted to do was pretend all
23:38
Speaker 2: that didn't exist. And so I needed a new town
23:42
Speaker 2: to create the new me. Now these people know me,
23:45
Speaker 2: they're not going to know anybody to ask questions. The
23:47
Speaker 2: fake resume was the symbolic of everything that I was
23:52
Speaker 2: trying to do.
23:53
Speaker 1: It's interesting for me to hear you talk about each
23:56
Speaker 1: of these people and feel your energy. It's different when
23:59
Speaker 1: you talk about.
23:59
Speaker 2: Each one of them. I adore my mother.
24:02
Speaker 1: You adore your mother. What I'm feeling.
24:05
Speaker 2: I feel sorry for Larry. I never knew Woody well enough.
24:10
Speaker 1: Why the emotion and the tears for Larry.
24:13
Speaker 2: I so desperately wanted him to like me that never
24:17
Speaker 2: went away.
24:18
Speaker 1: So the tears are really for you maybe.
24:21
Speaker 2: And for him. I actually finished my book and I
24:24
Speaker 2: had turned it in. Larry had a heart attack, and
24:28
Speaker 2: my sister called me and said, you know, Larry died
24:30
Speaker 2: for several minutes last night, but they revived him. And
24:34
Speaker 2: she said, I'm just letting you know. She didn't say
24:37
Speaker 2: come down. She left that up to me. And I
24:40
Speaker 2: called my therapist and she said, what are you going
24:43
Speaker 2: to hope you did five years from now? Seems very simple,
24:46
Speaker 2: but it's a great question in a lot of different ways.
24:49
Speaker 2: And I was like, I'm going to wish that I
24:51
Speaker 2: went down there, even if it was just a support missy.
24:54
Speaker 2: So I drove to Springfield and on the middle of
24:58
Speaker 2: the table was a letter from Larry. A seven page
25:03
Speaker 2: letter was an apology letter. It was not an apology
25:08
Speaker 2: about his treatment to me when I was a kid.
25:13
Speaker 2: It said nothing of him not being my father. It
25:16
Speaker 2: was very specifically about him never really getting to know
25:21
Speaker 2: me or my kids. And he said, you don't talk
25:24
Speaker 2: to me anymore, and I know why, and I'm sorry.
25:28
Speaker 2: And I was able to go to the hospital and
25:32
Speaker 2: forgive him. I think I wrote in the book that
25:34
Speaker 2: when I told him that I loved him, because I
25:38
Speaker 2: wasn't sure if I really did or not, that it
25:39
Speaker 2: felt like throwing a curveball. With a broken arm. It
25:42
Speaker 2: was not easy to push out of my mouth. I
25:44
Speaker 2: had not told him that I loved him since I
25:46
Speaker 2: was a very little kid, and I had never said
25:48
Speaker 2: it to my real father. And I was like, it's
25:50
Speaker 2: what he needs to hear, and what the hell, just
25:54
Speaker 2: do it? So I did.
25:55
Speaker 1: How do you feel in hindsight?
25:57
Speaker 2: Good? I'm glad I did. And like twenty minutes later,
26:01
Speaker 2: Crazy Larry came out and I was telling my sister
26:04
Speaker 2: a story about me running in the tough mutter and
26:07
Speaker 2: adding up in the medic tent and then he goes,
26:09
Speaker 2: god damn stupid, more on move per usual, and my
26:12
Speaker 2: sister and I just laughed about it. We went She's like, well,
26:15
Speaker 2: we're not crazy.
26:16
Speaker 1: He's still I'm missing the years where you really found
26:22
Speaker 1: a version of yourself from nineteen on. Talk to me
26:26
Speaker 1: about that time period.
26:28
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well one, I found my people. So I went
26:32
Speaker 2: into restaurants and I met these people in restaurants and
26:35
Speaker 2: became so intrigued about food and one hostelling service. And
26:39
Speaker 2: I met the restaurant people and I go, wait a second,
26:42
Speaker 2: these people are smart, you know a lot about food,
26:45
Speaker 2: wind music, and they're dangerous. I mean they go out
26:50
Speaker 2: like four in the morning, and I'm like, they're cool, man.
26:54
Speaker 2: I mean, like everybody else is boring compared to these people.
26:57
Speaker 2: So I was like, Okay, I can hang with these folks.
27:01
Speaker 2: That was fun. It was for a few years where
27:03
Speaker 2: I was saving all that money up and like I
27:05
Speaker 2: met the girl that I opened up my first restaurant with,
27:07
Speaker 2: and I found my running buddies and friends, and I
27:10
Speaker 2: didn't need to sleep much. So I would go and
27:12
Speaker 2: I would sprint hard in the dining room floor and
27:15
Speaker 2: then I would go straight from the dining room floor
27:17
Speaker 2: to the bar, from the bar to the bed, and
27:20
Speaker 2: I'd wake up in the morning and I'd run six miles.
27:22
Speaker 2: I was a maniac. I was a total maniac.
27:25
Speaker 1: Are you experiencing highs and lows at this time?
27:27
Speaker 2: Yeah? I would still experience all the crashes, and so
27:30
Speaker 2: the running was part of like the crashes, because I
27:34
Speaker 2: would wake up and I would be hungover and I
27:36
Speaker 2: would feel like I wanted to die, and I would
27:39
Speaker 2: go run and I'd feel a little better, and I'd
27:41
Speaker 2: feel terrible to work, and then work would make me
27:44
Speaker 2: feel better again. And then as soon as I started
27:46
Speaker 2: to crash, then I would add some tequila to the
27:49
Speaker 2: equation and then I would feel better again. And I
27:51
Speaker 2: was like, well, if I just keep doing this for
27:53
Speaker 2: forty years, I mean, what could go wrong?
27:55
Speaker 1: You felt like it was fine, like you had found
27:57
Speaker 1: the potion.
27:57
Speaker 3: Yeah.
27:58
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, well this is fine, this is
27:59
Speaker 2: not unhealthy. What's five to seven margaritas the night between friends?
28:03
Speaker 2: And then that gets to be a little bit more.
28:05
Speaker 2: And I knew it was pretty good at it, and
28:07
Speaker 2: I instantly just what made you good at it? I
28:09
Speaker 2: didn't have very good technical skill in the beginning, as
28:13
Speaker 2: far as wine service or being able to talk about
28:18
Speaker 2: tawar and what great wines were and the characteristics of
28:21
Speaker 2: the individual pina noirs in the list. And I wasn't
28:24
Speaker 2: good at table maintenance, and I wasn't serving from the
28:26
Speaker 2: left side with my left hand yet, and all these
28:28
Speaker 2: technical skills that I had not learned, but I still
28:31
Speaker 2: got a ton of call tables. General manager is baffled
28:33
Speaker 2: by it. You would tell me, he goes, you are
28:36
Speaker 2: not a great server. I understand why you get eight
28:39
Speaker 2: freaking call tables tonight. My emotional intelligence is good and
28:43
Speaker 2: I was really concerned with people having a good time.
28:46
Speaker 2: Then I was able to catch up on the technical
28:48
Speaker 2: skill part of it. So as soon as that happened,
28:52
Speaker 2: I was like, Okay, I could open up my own restaurant.
28:54
Speaker 2: I looked at the people I was working for. I
28:55
Speaker 2: was like, these people sort of know what they're doing,
28:59
Speaker 2: but I don't think they know what the doing a
29:00
Speaker 2: whole lot more than I do. I think I can
29:02
Speaker 2: go do this. So I went and opened up a
29:05
Speaker 2: six table restaurant on the money I had saved up
29:07
Speaker 2: with my girlfriend at the time, and we went to work.
29:11
Speaker 1: How do you look back on that time?
29:12
Speaker 2: Oh my god, it was just absolute and total chaos.
29:16
Speaker 2: It was so poorly drawn up. I mean we opened
29:18
Speaker 2: for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and there was two of us,
29:20
Speaker 2: which means you'd get there at like six am and
29:22
Speaker 2: work till like midnight. We dropped breakfast pretty quickly because
29:26
Speaker 2: it wasn't sustainable. But her and I had deeply fallen
29:31
Speaker 2: for each other. But we're both pretty hot blooded and
29:35
Speaker 2: so instant way to ruin a good relationship open up
29:38
Speaker 2: a restaurant together. So we ran hot because sometimes there'd
29:43
Speaker 2: be forty people in our dining room and it was
29:45
Speaker 2: two of us washing dishes, serving, prepping, cooking, she was
29:51
Speaker 2: a chef on the line. I would have the cold station.
29:55
Speaker 2: We would both wash dishes, and she had a daughter
29:59
Speaker 2: and her daughter. It was underneath this counter we had
30:03
Speaker 2: with a little TVVCR combination watching The Little Mermaid. It
30:07
Speaker 2: was absolute insanity. But for those first six months, I
30:10
Speaker 2: wrote something in my journal and it was like, not
30:12
Speaker 2: sure if this business will ever fill my pockets, but
30:15
Speaker 2: it sures how fills my soul. And I was pretty
30:18
Speaker 2: poetic for twenty one year old kid. And so I
30:21
Speaker 2: was happy and it was mine. I could go out
30:23
Speaker 2: and be able to be like, oh, what do you
30:24
Speaker 2: do for a living? And I was like, Oh, I
30:26
Speaker 2: own lazy days cafe. That made me feel so good.
30:29
Speaker 2: I had something that was me.
30:31
Speaker 1: You weren't saying like I'm waiting tables at this restaurant and.
30:35
Speaker 2: I can tell Larry that I'm a restaurant owner.
30:38
Speaker 1: That's big.
30:39
Speaker 2: It was big.
30:40
Speaker 1: So how does one cafe turn into forty six it's.
30:45
Speaker 2: A good restaurant openings, Well, you find out a certain point.
30:48
Speaker 2: The size of our restaurant was a really bad size.
30:51
Speaker 2: We didn't have great weather conditions in our restaurant. It
30:54
Speaker 2: was like a back deck that had like plastic biz
30:57
Speaker 2: Queen wrapped around it with a kerosene heater if it
31:00
Speaker 2: got really cold. We were kind of screwed, and so
31:03
Speaker 2: seaside Florida became very popular. Somebody bought that building and
31:06
Speaker 2: they bought us out, and I went up the street
31:09
Speaker 2: and I go one, are my three favorite things? Well,
31:12
Speaker 2: I love sushi, I love one, I love rock and roll,
31:15
Speaker 2: one hundred one's by the glass, sushi till three o'clock
31:18
Speaker 2: in the morning, live rock and roll seven nights a week. Now,
31:20
Speaker 2: that sounds like, oh, what a cool concept. In the
31:23
Speaker 2: Panana of Florida in nineteen ninety five, it was just
31:26
Speaker 2: downright weird. But people dug it and there was only
31:30
Speaker 2: a couple places to drink late night on thirty A,
31:32
Speaker 2: which is now kind of a famous road, and we
31:36
Speaker 2: killed it. It was busy and I was having a blast,
31:39
Speaker 2: and I probably would have stayed there a long time,
31:40
Speaker 2: but somebody came made me an offer to buy it,
31:43
Speaker 2: and I was like, I guess I'm flipping restaurants. I
31:47
Speaker 2: still wanted more. It was still stuck together with bubb
31:49
Speaker 2: gum and Scotch tape, and I was like, I want
31:52
Speaker 2: something just a little nicer. Something it feels a little
31:55
Speaker 2: more real and weirdly enough, I took the money I
31:58
Speaker 2: made off of that, and I went back home to
32:01
Speaker 2: Springful of Illinois, and I said, Okay, I'm going to
32:04
Speaker 2: show everybody what I've done. You know, it was like
32:07
Speaker 2: this also ran kid in Springfield. You know, I was
32:10
Speaker 2: a kid on the other side of the tracks who
32:12
Speaker 2: went to like not the best high school and lived
32:14
Speaker 2: in the little house. And I wanted to go back
32:16
Speaker 2: and say, I'm going to open up the best restaurant
32:17
Speaker 2: in Springfilloinois and you know, maybe I can buy in
32:22
Speaker 2: some respectability in my hometown, make Larry proud. And I
32:25
Speaker 2: told Mom to quit her job. I go quit your
32:28
Speaker 2: job at TJ Max and come do this restaurant with me,
32:31
Speaker 2: and she did for those special years. It's very special,
32:35
Speaker 2: very special because my mom was so hard working and
32:40
Speaker 2: so smart, and if you gave her a project, she
32:43
Speaker 2: was going to do it ten x better than you
32:45
Speaker 2: drew it up. And she was brilliant.
32:47
Speaker 1: You said your mom hid from the world most of
32:49
Speaker 1: her life and only found peace and purpose after twenty
32:53
Speaker 1: nineteen when she got her cancer diagnosis. You describe it
32:57
Speaker 1: as the best time of her life. She described it
32:59
Speaker 1: as she described it, and it's because she found out
33:04
Speaker 1: how people really loved her. It's hard for me to
33:06
Speaker 1: wrap my head around.
33:08
Speaker 2: It's a heartbreaking statement. Because I interviewed her and I
33:11
Speaker 2: asked her, I said, Mom, what was the turning point
33:13
Speaker 2: of your life? She said, after I got diagnosed with cancer.
33:17
Speaker 2: I found out that people really loved me and weren't
33:20
Speaker 2: just tolerating me.
33:22
Speaker 1: Wow.
33:23
Speaker 2: And I was texting this back and forth with her,
33:26
Speaker 2: and I just cried. I was just was like, Mom,
33:29
Speaker 2: she really did think that her whole life, that she
33:31
Speaker 2: was so hard to love. I started reading her diaries
33:35
Speaker 2: after she died, and I couldn't read them, and my
33:39
Speaker 2: therapist said, don't read them. She was like, they were
33:41
Speaker 2: never meant for anybody else to read. They were meant
33:43
Speaker 2: for her to read. And she said that's how she
33:45
Speaker 2: was feeling at that exact moment. It doesn't mean that
33:48
Speaker 2: she felt like that all the time.
33:49
Speaker 1: Did watching her find peace towards the end of her
33:52
Speaker 1: life influence your process at all?
33:55
Speaker 2: It did, because she really did seem so zen and
34:00
Speaker 2: it was the best version of her that I had
34:02
Speaker 2: ever seen. Even with me, my mom was not super
34:05
Speaker 2: excitable and she threw around compliments like manhole covers, and
34:09
Speaker 2: so for the first time she was saying stuff like
34:12
Speaker 2: you know, it really amazed me, and it was this
34:15
Speaker 2: really sweet version of my mom. And I was like,
34:17
Speaker 2: it proved that there is evolution with people and that
34:22
Speaker 2: you can get better. My whole life, I knew there
34:25
Speaker 2: was something wrong with me, but it took me a
34:27
Speaker 2: long time to figure that out. You know, I remember
34:29
Speaker 2: being a kid. When you get in bad moods a lot,
34:32
Speaker 2: or you get dark a lot, you just think everybody's
34:35
Speaker 2: like that. It's a herculean leap to go from I'm
34:39
Speaker 2: in a bad mood sometimes time bipolar, and so my
34:42
Speaker 2: mom was definitely bipolar. So, you know, as I looked
34:45
Speaker 2: back on it, and I was like, oh my god,
34:47
Speaker 2: my mom had a worse than I did, and her
34:49
Speaker 2: mom had it. My mom always talked about how depressed
34:52
Speaker 2: her mom always was. So the first time I ever
34:55
Speaker 2: went to a therapist when I was twenty seven. When
34:57
Speaker 2: I was twenty seven, I didn't go to a therapist
34:59
Speaker 2: to get for twenty three years. I went one time.
35:02
Speaker 2: She was an hour and a half evaluation. She was kevin,
35:05
Speaker 2: I think you might be bipolar, and I told her
35:07
Speaker 2: to go at herself. I was like, you don't get it.
35:11
Speaker 1: Stay in the back of your mind.
35:12
Speaker 2: A little bit. I was like, you don't know me
35:16
Speaker 2: not bipolar. People throw bipolar around a lot. That's like
35:19
Speaker 2: a dig on somebody, right, They're like, oh, man, she's crazy,
35:23
Speaker 2: she's bipolar. And so when I heard that, it was
35:26
Speaker 2: like somebody telling me that I was crazy. And I
35:29
Speaker 2: was like, no, no, no, no, My mom and dad
35:32
Speaker 2: are bipolar. Haven't you seen my life? My life's amazing.
35:35
Speaker 2: I get a bad mood every once a while.
35:48
Speaker 1: You write in the book ambition and adrenaline was your
35:50
Speaker 1: drug of choice. So how did you learn the difference
35:56
Speaker 1: between this healthy drive and what you didn't know at
36:00
Speaker 1: the time was bipolar disorder.
36:03
Speaker 2: There's the loss of diminishing returns with anything, and so
36:05
Speaker 2: every time I opened up a restaurant had the big opening,
36:08
Speaker 2: it was like up here and then it was here,
36:11
Speaker 2: and then it was here, and then it was here,
36:13
Speaker 2: And so I knew that wasn't giving me the same
36:15
Speaker 2: response that it used to. But then when you're standing
36:18
Speaker 2: on a ledge in Los Angeles getting ready to jump,
36:23
Speaker 2: you start to realize that everything you thought was true
36:27
Speaker 2: was not true, and that all the things that you
36:30
Speaker 2: had done didn't really mean anything. If you were miserable
36:34
Speaker 2: and sad and wanted to die and wanted to check
36:38
Speaker 2: out your life felt so bad that you were willing
36:43
Speaker 2: to leave your family and your friends and leave this earth,
36:47
Speaker 2: then pretty much everything that you were doing was probably wrong.
36:51
Speaker 2: It's a tough thing to think that all the stuff
36:54
Speaker 2: I've done all this year is right now means absolutely nothing.
36:58
Speaker 2: That was the rock bottom, and then that was the gift.
37:01
Speaker 2: Do you think that's true that it was a gift?
37:03
Speaker 1: No, that it meant nothing.
37:05
Speaker 2: No, not now? Yeah, not now, because it kept me alive.
37:09
Speaker 2: So once the dust settled and I was able to
37:12
Speaker 2: look back on it, and I was like, Okay, first
37:14
Speaker 2: of all, one, there's been a lot of great things
37:16
Speaker 2: that you've done in your life. Two, you have had
37:19
Speaker 2: a lot of really joyful moments that you helped produce.
37:23
Speaker 2: Three You've done a lot of things that have helped
37:25
Speaker 2: people throughout your life. And you have provided a lot
37:28
Speaker 2: of beautiful experiences for people. And the problem was like
37:33
Speaker 2: I just wasn't doing it in the right way. I
37:35
Speaker 2: needed to be a part of it again in a
37:38
Speaker 2: way that I could feel it again, I become numb.
37:40
Speaker 2: I wasn't feeling it anymore. So I've been an extremist
37:44
Speaker 2: my whole life, and so coming off that ledge, I
37:49
Speaker 2: was like, I'm gonna throw the kitchen sink the happiness.
37:53
Speaker 2: If somebody's done it for happiness, I'm gonna try it.
37:56
Speaker 1: Because you had thrown in the kitchen sink on every restaurant,
37:59
Speaker 1: every project you've ever worked one which time you chose happiness.
38:02
Speaker 2: This time I've thrown it in myself. Yeah. I had
38:05
Speaker 2: done all this for business and all those things my
38:07
Speaker 2: whole life, and I'd done a bunch of superficial stuff.
38:09
Speaker 2: But I was like, the real work. What is the
38:12
Speaker 2: real work that I'm gonna do. So that was in
38:16
Speaker 2: the beginning therapy five days a week, stopping drinking. I
38:20
Speaker 2: stopped walking dining rooms and being around people for a
38:23
Speaker 2: series of months. Went to both my companies, in both
38:26
Speaker 2: my C suites and said, leave me alone for a while.
38:29
Speaker 2: I told me to leave me alone for a while.
38:30
Speaker 2: The next day, like several people called me and I
38:32
Speaker 2: was like, I don't think you heard me yesterday. Leave
38:34
Speaker 2: me alone. I did ayahuasca, I did buffo, I got
38:38
Speaker 2: on medication, and I went to Hoffman. And I know
38:41
Speaker 2: you've talked about Hoffman before, and you want a big,
38:45
Speaker 2: heaping spoonful of self awareness, go to Hoffman. It's not
38:50
Speaker 2: just about you, it's about your parents. And this idea
38:52
Speaker 2: that ninety percent of who you are is because you
38:55
Speaker 2: either tried to emulate or rebel against a parent. With me,
38:59
Speaker 2: it was so true.
39:00
Speaker 1: Why do you think you were so open to everything
39:03
Speaker 1: this time?
39:04
Speaker 2: Because the alternative was dying. I had come to a
39:08
Speaker 2: point in my life where when I got on a
39:10
Speaker 2: plane and if there was extreme turbulence, I'd be pretty
39:14
Speaker 2: okay with this plane crashing right now, that's a bad
39:16
Speaker 2: place to be. Or when I got really anxious and
39:20
Speaker 2: really stressed out, my mantra was, if it gets any worse,
39:24
Speaker 2: you can just kill yourself. I mean, what a terrible, dangerous,
39:28
Speaker 2: awful place to be. And so I'm gonna try everything.
39:32
Speaker 2: And I was hoping something would stick, you know, but
39:36
Speaker 2: this is all stuff I'd never tried before. There was
39:37
Speaker 2: some low hanging fruit there. Therapy was some low hanging fruit.
39:41
Speaker 2: Medication was really low hanging fruit. And my therapist asked me,
39:45
Speaker 2: she goes, why do you think that you've never done
39:48
Speaker 2: this stuff. You try everything else. Why do you think
39:51
Speaker 2: you've not done this? And it came back to Larry
39:55
Speaker 2: only believed in the traditional ways to get somewhere. You
39:59
Speaker 2: go to college, you get a degree, this is what
40:01
Speaker 2: you do, pay your taxes, you get life insurance, you
40:04
Speaker 2: get married at a young age, you have two children.
40:07
Speaker 2: And I wanted to be the opposite to him. My
40:09
Speaker 2: rebellion from him was I'm not going to do anything traditional,
40:14
Speaker 2: and so I was like, I don't need therapy. I'm
40:17
Speaker 2: going to go float in a tank for an hour.
40:19
Speaker 2: I was starting to hurt myself in my rebellion against him.
40:23
Speaker 1: Do you remember the first moment that you thought I've
40:27
Speaker 1: made it and what that feeling was like versus the
40:30
Speaker 1: feeling now when you're sitting and like you've really made it.
40:34
Speaker 2: You know. And my profession, the James Beard Award is
40:37
Speaker 2: like the biggest thing that you can win.
40:38
Speaker 1: Yeah.
40:39
Speaker 2: My partner and I won Outstanding Restaurant Tours in America
40:43
Speaker 2: in twenty nineteen, and man, for about a week, everything
40:47
Speaker 2: was right in the world. It's kind of like my mom.
40:49
Speaker 2: I was like, Wow, people do like me. Oh, thank god.
40:52
Speaker 2: And I reached his pinnacle and nobody can take that
40:54
Speaker 2: away from me, and I felt like I made it.
40:56
Speaker 2: I was like, man, that's my Oscar. It lasted for
40:59
Speaker 2: about a week to really making it was in the
41:01
Speaker 2: last year. It was a very quiet moment. I had
41:04
Speaker 2: finished my book and I was sitting in my house,
41:08
Speaker 2: my new house that I really love, and I was
41:13
Speaker 2: listening to Miles Davis Kind of Blue, and my girlfriend
41:18
Speaker 2: was there, and I was just having the most beautiful,
41:21
Speaker 2: peaceful night, and I just thought to myself that I
41:24
Speaker 2: was really happy. My whole life had been about creating
41:27
Speaker 2: these giant, loud moments. I lived a really loud life,
41:32
Speaker 2: and I found happiness in the quiet. Miles Davis Kind
41:36
Speaker 2: of Blue was the album I opened service with every
41:39
Speaker 2: single night. That album was at lazy Days start with
41:43
Speaker 2: so What, and it was just playing in the background,
41:46
Speaker 2: sort of the soundtrack of my life. But instead of
41:49
Speaker 2: working a room this time, I was just sitting with myself.
41:52
Speaker 1: I think it takes a lot of courage to write
41:54
Speaker 1: a book while you're still kind of going through all
41:57
Speaker 1: of the feelings.
41:58
Speaker 2: I was writing the book while I was living it,
42:00
Speaker 2: and so once I got to like chapter thirteen, it
42:03
Speaker 2: was no longer the past I was writing about. I
42:06
Speaker 2: was writing about while it was happening.
42:08
Speaker 1: That's sort of my question, because you don't get that
42:11
Speaker 1: A lot a lot of people write in hindsight, and
42:15
Speaker 1: I understand why they do it. Why did you choose
42:19
Speaker 1: to write, to quote Rene Brown in the messy Middle?
42:22
Speaker 2: Well, there had to be a beginning, of middle and
42:25
Speaker 2: an end. And when I started writing the book, I
42:28
Speaker 2: hadn't figured it all out yet. I was in the
42:30
Speaker 2: mess at that point, and so I was hoping something
42:34
Speaker 2: was going to happen. It was going to button it
42:36
Speaker 2: all up. And honestly, i'd written the ending before Larry
42:41
Speaker 2: passed away. I remember. I think it was my publisher's like,
42:44
Speaker 2: you know, you have to take the book back right.
42:46
Speaker 2: Life just kept happening, and it was like I was
42:48
Speaker 2: writing in a journal some of.
42:50
Speaker 1: Those loud moments that you mentioned. Your life seems so
42:53
Speaker 1: rooted in connection, and you have such great stories. Can
42:58
Speaker 1: you share a story from your restaurant life that really
43:04
Speaker 1: means something to you.
43:04
Speaker 2: One of my favorites is at the Indigo Wine Bar
43:07
Speaker 2: in the mid nineties. A man it was his wedding anniversary,
43:12
Speaker 2: and on his wedding night, his father had given him
43:15
Speaker 2: a bottle of nineteen sixty one Chateau Lafitte, and so
43:18
Speaker 2: he came to me and said, hey, this is really special.
43:21
Speaker 2: Today we're going to open this bottle. You know, sixty
43:24
Speaker 2: one Lafet's one of the most expensive and most renowned
43:26
Speaker 2: bottles of one in history nineteen twenty nine, nineteen forty five,
43:29
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty one, nineteen eighty two, the best years in
43:31
Speaker 2: Bordeaux and sixty one. You know, this is a multi
43:35
Speaker 2: thousand dollars bottle. The invitation to the wedding anniversary was
43:40
Speaker 2: a picture of the bottle. It represented his father being
43:43
Speaker 2: there that night because his father had passed away. So
43:46
Speaker 2: he brought it to me about forty five minutes before
43:48
Speaker 2: the party started for me to decant it, and we
43:50
Speaker 2: were going to display it. He had a podium, We're
43:52
Speaker 2: going to put it on it. And I go to
43:54
Speaker 2: open up the bottle of wine and it's court. He
43:56
Speaker 2: had stored it all these years, and it was bad,
43:58
Speaker 2: and he cried in front to me. He couldn't believe it,
44:01
Speaker 2: like hysterically crying. And I was like, sir, what if
44:04
Speaker 2: I replace it with one of these bottles up here?
44:06
Speaker 2: And he's like, Kevin these people are super wine savvy.
44:09
Speaker 2: They're going to know that this bottle right here is
44:13
Speaker 2: not that ninety seven silver oak, you know. I was like, wait,
44:18
Speaker 2: I go, there's an old man here who has this
44:20
Speaker 2: incredible wine cellar, and he's so sweet and such a romantic.
44:23
Speaker 2: He goes, Kevin, I don't have the money to buy that.
44:25
Speaker 2: I go just a wile a second. I call my
44:27
Speaker 2: friend up and he goes, hold on, cause Beck, He goes,
44:31
Speaker 2: I don't have a sixty one, but I have a
44:32
Speaker 2: sixty six. I was like, I'll be there in a second.
44:35
Speaker 2: How much do you want for it? He's like, one
44:36
Speaker 2: hundred bucks cash money. Drap my car, race down there,
44:39
Speaker 2: and grabbed the bottle of sixty six. One hundred bucks down,
44:41
Speaker 2: go back, decant that bottle. It's perfect. We rin outh
44:45
Speaker 2: the bottle of sixty one, pour it out, put it
44:48
Speaker 2: next to the decanter. Throw away the bottle of sixty six.
44:51
Speaker 2: And right when I do that, everybody comes into the room.
44:53
Speaker 2: He pours wine for everybody and he tells this beautiful
44:56
Speaker 2: story about his father. Everybody's crying in the house, and
45:00
Speaker 2: then everybody tries the wine, and the whole chatters about
45:03
Speaker 2: this is the greatest glass of wine I've ever had
45:05
Speaker 2: my entire life. And he comes over to me. He
45:08
Speaker 2: pours me two ounces of the wine, and he puts
45:11
Speaker 2: his hands on my cheeks. He kisses me on both cheeks,
45:13
Speaker 2: and he goes, you are a beautiful liar, young man.
45:17
Speaker 2: He goes, My father would have loved this story. I
45:21
Speaker 2: completely changed the temperature of what would have been a disaster.
45:26
Speaker 2: And I was like, this is my purpose in life.
45:29
Speaker 2: I get to play a cameo role in people's lives,
45:31
Speaker 2: sometimes really big moments, and I'm that guy that comes
45:35
Speaker 2: in for a second and can steal the scene and
45:37
Speaker 2: then dart back out. And so then I became obsessed
45:40
Speaker 2: with finding those moments where I would dart in.
45:42
Speaker 1: I've never heard anybody put it that way, and I
45:45
Speaker 1: love that because we all have the opportunity to do that.
45:50
Speaker 1: You mentioned purpose. You faced homelessness, bankruptcy, You've dealt with
45:55
Speaker 1: being bipolar, divorce, and there's some trials that I haven't
45:59
Speaker 1: even named in that list. You've opened fifty restaurants and
46:02
Speaker 1: you've become a leader in the independent restaurant coalition. People
46:06
Speaker 1: in hospitality idolize you like you say your name and
46:08
Speaker 1: hospitality and people's eyes light up. Those are some highs
46:11
Speaker 1: and lows. Yeah, what did the lows teach you about purpose?
46:15
Speaker 2: The lows taught me that if I don't protect and
46:22
Speaker 2: restore myself, that I'm not going to be able to
46:25
Speaker 2: restore other people moving forward. And that's really what I
46:28
Speaker 2: want to do. If my purpose is restoration, then I
46:32
Speaker 2: have to constantly set boundaries and set rules for myself
46:37
Speaker 2: that allow myself to be restorative. I'm the happiest ever
46:41
Speaker 2: been in my life right now, the second, thank God,
46:44
Speaker 2: and so it still allows me to do some pretty
46:46
Speaker 2: great things when I have those moments where I know
46:49
Speaker 2: I can like dart In for a second.
46:50
Speaker 1: It's interesting for me to hear that you've never been
46:52
Speaker 1: happier because you said it's actually never been harder to
46:55
Speaker 1: be happy. Yes, I think that statement will resonate with
46:59
Speaker 1: a lot of people.
47:00
Speaker 2: People.
47:00
Speaker 1: Yes, I have a weird relationship with that statement, Kevin. Okay,
47:06
Speaker 1: and I don't know why I do, but I want
47:09
Speaker 1: to better understand because I think most people would agree
47:12
Speaker 1: with you.
47:12
Speaker 2: I got some hacks for it, though, Okay. Well, one
47:15
Speaker 2: is I treat my pantry and I treat my social
47:20
Speaker 2: media feed the same way. If I keep junk food
47:25
Speaker 2: in my pantry, I will eventually eat it. If there's
47:29
Speaker 2: Dorito's in there, there is going to be some night
47:31
Speaker 2: where it's like one point thirty in the morning'll be like,
47:33
Speaker 2: fuck it, give me the cool rechtritos. If I keep
47:36
Speaker 2: stuff on my feed that is bombastic or negative, or
47:42
Speaker 2: I keep it on there because I like to be outraged,
47:45
Speaker 2: sometimes I will carry that energy with me all day,
47:49
Speaker 2: and so I put both of those things on a diet.
47:52
Speaker 2: I only keep things in my pantry that I think
47:54
Speaker 2: serve me, and I only keep things in my feed
47:57
Speaker 2: that I think serve me. And my feed isn't just
48:00
Speaker 2: my social feed, it's also the people that I converse
48:03
Speaker 2: with and talk to on a daily basis. And so
48:05
Speaker 2: I challenge everybody out there to look at everything in
48:08
Speaker 2: their life, including the contagious behavior that they surround themselves
48:12
Speaker 2: by with people. I don't hang out with the exact
48:15
Speaker 2: same people that I used to hang out with. The
48:17
Speaker 2: fuck I've added some real beauties in these last few years. Man.
48:21
Speaker 2: And there are a couple of people that know me
48:23
Speaker 2: only is the person that I am. Now, Oh that's interesting,
48:27
Speaker 2: And so they don't have an expectation level set of
48:29
Speaker 2: me as the old me. What is that like, I
48:33
Speaker 2: went a year without drinking. I'm not drinking right now,
48:37
Speaker 2: but like when I first did it, and this is
48:39
Speaker 2: like maybe twenty twenty two, I went a year and
48:43
Speaker 2: I decided to have some drinks because we had something
48:46
Speaker 2: to celebrate. And afterwards, I went to a friend's birthday
48:49
Speaker 2: and they were pouring tequila shots and she looked at
48:52
Speaker 2: me and she's like, oh, too bad, you're not drinking.
48:54
Speaker 2: And I was like, actually, I'm drinking tonight. And I
48:56
Speaker 2: took a drink and she put her hands on my
48:57
Speaker 2: cheeks and sheeses, yes, I love drunk. And I looked
49:00
Speaker 2: at her and I go, everybody loves drunk Kevin except
49:04
Speaker 2: for drunk Kevin, and yes. I continued to drink that night,
49:06
Speaker 2: and then the next day I was.
49:07
Speaker 1: Like, damn it.
49:08
Speaker 2: And since that time, I haven't had a night where
49:11
Speaker 2: I went off the rails like that, and I haven't
49:13
Speaker 2: had a drink in months and months. It just doesn't
49:16
Speaker 2: serve me anymore. But there was a certain amount of
49:19
Speaker 2: people that were like, come on, give me tequila Kevin.
49:22
Speaker 2: He's a blest and I'm like, hey, man, sober Kevin
49:27
Speaker 2: can be a lot of fun too. I heard Rob
49:29
Speaker 2: mosay that he thought when he got sober that he
49:32
Speaker 2: was never gonna have fun over again. That's what his
49:34
Speaker 2: original thought was. And I guess I thought about that
49:37
Speaker 2: a little bit too, that I wasn't gonna be able
49:39
Speaker 2: to have fun if I was sober. It's so wrong, man,
49:42
Speaker 2: I'm having so much more fun in this.
49:44
Speaker 3: Version of myself than I did that old version of myself.
49:58
Speaker 1: So you say that your actual bottom is a supreme
50:01
Speaker 1: gift and that all the supposed rock bottoms before it
50:04
Speaker 1: were fucking pretenders. I love when I have to read
50:07
Speaker 1: people's quotes and they make me curse. What is the
50:09
Speaker 1: difference between a real rock bottom and a pretend one.
50:14
Speaker 2: Well, the pretend one is one that you go back
50:16
Speaker 2: and just keep doing the same behavior. So a lot
50:20
Speaker 2: of people have back problems. They go to the chiropractor.
50:22
Speaker 2: Chiropractor is just but the problem is they stand in
50:26
Speaker 2: a certain way, or one legs longer than the other,
50:28
Speaker 2: and so it just goes back to the same problem
50:30
Speaker 2: again and the guy adjusts you. And this is the
50:33
Speaker 2: whole financial model for chiropractors. Instead, how about get orthopedic shoes,
50:39
Speaker 2: or really correct the problem, or go get surgery? What
50:41
Speaker 2: have you? A lot of times with alcoholics or addicts,
50:47
Speaker 2: And I've listened to Dak Shepperd talk about this before
50:50
Speaker 2: that he has like thirty six entries in his Alcoholics
50:53
Speaker 2: Anonymous book. There were all the times he thought he
50:55
Speaker 2: hit rock bottom until he finally hit rock bottom. And
50:59
Speaker 2: so for me, I kept going through these moments where
51:02
Speaker 2: I felt like I wanted to die or I had
51:05
Speaker 2: suicidal ideation. Then I feel okay again, I go back
51:08
Speaker 2: to the same behavior, and I ended up in the
51:10
Speaker 2: same place. I finally had to fix it at its foundation.
51:14
Speaker 2: So if you're going through anything depression, addiction, just general
51:20
Speaker 2: malaise and unhappiness, usually you have to go twenty steps
51:24
Speaker 2: backwards to go fifty steps forward. And most people aren't
51:27
Speaker 2: courageous enough to take that bargain. They're like, I already
51:30
Speaker 2: feel like crap, and you want me to get worse.
51:34
Speaker 2: What are you talking about. That's where I was for
51:37
Speaker 2: a long time. And then when you have a moment
51:40
Speaker 2: like I did in Los Angeles, I was like, if
51:44
Speaker 2: I don't really correct it at its core, I'm gonna die.
51:49
Speaker 1: What led to the moment in LA.
51:51
Speaker 2: In successive order, my mom passed away, we closed all
51:55
Speaker 2: of our restaurants. My partner and I had to borrow
51:59
Speaker 2: basically million dollars just to keep our company afloat, because
52:04
Speaker 2: we had like ten million dollars a year in rent alone.
52:07
Speaker 2: We had a couple thousand employees that you know, paid
52:10
Speaker 2: for everybody's insurance, made sure everybody was intact. We were
52:13
Speaker 2: burning money at a rate that we were only going
52:16
Speaker 2: to be able to be open for so long, and
52:19
Speaker 2: then there would be like some government intervention and then
52:22
Speaker 2: we would use all of that and then it would
52:24
Speaker 2: start up again. Every day felt like I was going
52:26
Speaker 2: to step on a landline. And then there were like
52:29
Speaker 2: little moments where it seemed like everybody was also turning
52:34
Speaker 2: their guns on the restaurant industry. Somebody wrote some terrible
52:38
Speaker 2: blog post about us, and I just couldn't handle it anymore.
52:42
Speaker 2: I just felt like my marriage was crumbling, and I
52:45
Speaker 2: felt like everybody was turning their guns in the restaurant business,
52:48
Speaker 2: and I didn't have my mom to call, and I
52:50
Speaker 2: didn't know if we were going to stay in business
52:52
Speaker 2: or not. I was having a nervous breakdown, and I
52:56
Speaker 2: also didn't have my restaurants to go into that were
53:01
Speaker 2: a joyous place. The restaurants felt like fear. And so
53:05
Speaker 2: I was in Los Angeles. I'd had a bad meeting.
53:08
Speaker 2: We were trying to open up a restaurant there. We
53:11
Speaker 2: were in the middle of building a restaurant during the pandemic,
53:13
Speaker 2: and we couldn't even open it, and we were bleeding money.
53:16
Speaker 2: And I went and sat at the bar at the
53:17
Speaker 2: hotel and had like fifteen drinks, and I woke up
53:21
Speaker 2: in the morning and I was terribly hungover and terribly depressed,
53:28
Speaker 2: and I just sat there and decided I was going
53:30
Speaker 2: to kill myself. I was trying to figure out which
53:32
Speaker 2: way I was going to do it.
53:33
Speaker 1: Sorry, you were in pain like that.
53:35
Speaker 2: That's awful. It's funny where the mind goes when things
53:38
Speaker 2: like that happened. First thing I thought of was what's
53:41
Speaker 2: the saddest song that I can put on that helps
53:45
Speaker 2: make this progress go faster. I had already decided I
53:49
Speaker 2: wanted to do it, and I wanted to feel as
53:51
Speaker 2: bad as I possibly could. I played that song on
53:54
Speaker 2: repeat for about two hours, and my saving grace was
54:00
Speaker 2: I stood on a ledge and I lifted my hands
54:04
Speaker 2: off of it to jump, and for the first time
54:06
Speaker 2: in two hours, my phone rang and it stopped the
54:09
Speaker 2: song Who called Nobody of Circumstance.
54:12
Speaker 1: You mentioned two quotes in the book that help you
54:15
Speaker 1: heal that I really love the first. Can I share it?
54:18
Speaker 1: Or do you want to share it? Sure, the magic
54:21
Speaker 1: you're looking for is in the work you are avoiding.
54:23
Speaker 2: And the second is everyone is responsible, but no one
54:27
Speaker 2: is to blame.
54:28
Speaker 1: How did those mantras help you move forward?
54:30
Speaker 2: Well? These both came later in life. One of my
54:33
Speaker 2: low points, somebody looked at me and it was one
54:36
Speaker 2: of those where you kind of get punched in the
54:38
Speaker 2: face by somebody really giving you the truth, and they're like, Kevin,
54:41
Speaker 2: you can keep going on these like silly hiking trips
54:44
Speaker 2: and thinking this is healing you. But if you really
54:47
Speaker 2: want to be well and you really want to be happy,
54:50
Speaker 2: do the work. Asshole?
54:52
Speaker 1: Who was saying that to you?
54:53
Speaker 2: This was I went on a hiking trip and I
54:58
Speaker 2: had had the.
54:58
Speaker 1: Gait Way to therapy, the gateway to therapy, the ranch
55:01
Speaker 1: at Live Oak.
55:02
Speaker 2: It's actually a really great place. It's amazing. You should go.
55:04
Speaker 2: It actually did help me a lot. But I was
55:06
Speaker 2: on the Mountain with a guy, and I was telling
55:09
Speaker 2: him all that was going on, and he was telling
55:11
Speaker 2: me why I should do ayahuasca and all this stuff,
55:13
Speaker 2: and I was like, I don't know about that, and
55:15
Speaker 2: he's like, well, have you got in therapy and was
55:17
Speaker 2: asking me all these pointed questions, all of which I
55:19
Speaker 2: was saying no to, And he was like, bro, the
55:21
Speaker 2: magic you're looking for is in the work you're avoiding.
55:24
Speaker 2: And sometimes when somebody gives you a whole lot of truth,
55:27
Speaker 2: it pisses you off. That was one of those moments
55:30
Speaker 2: where it stuck with me for weeks, and he was
55:34
Speaker 2: absolutely right the other quote, I was never going to
55:38
Speaker 2: get anywhere if I didn't forgive these three damaged people
55:41
Speaker 2: and understand him a little bit. And so if you
55:45
Speaker 2: scratch under the surface, Larry Bain was an only child
55:49
Speaker 2: who's had a mom who ran her house with an
55:52
Speaker 2: iron fist and was very cruel at times. So all
55:56
Speaker 2: those years, when he saw me, he saw Woody. And
56:00
Speaker 2: so when my father passed away at the very end,
56:04
Speaker 2: I saw who he was and I had empathy for him.
56:08
Speaker 2: It took me a really long time, and I was
56:12
Speaker 2: with him when he passed and we had a moment together.
56:15
Speaker 2: I never knew Larry Bam until the very end, and
56:18
Speaker 2: I don't blame him anymore. He's definitely a part of
56:21
Speaker 2: my story. He's definitely a part of why I became
56:24
Speaker 2: who I became. But I can look back and look
56:27
Speaker 2: at his patterns now and it wasn't his fault. It
56:30
Speaker 2: was just the cards he got dealt, the cards we
56:33
Speaker 2: got dealt. And then with Woody, I always thought that
56:36
Speaker 2: Woody got away with something, and so I look at
56:41
Speaker 2: all three of their stories now. They were all doing
56:44
Speaker 2: the best they could and they didn't always show up
56:47
Speaker 2: in the best way. But I haven't always showed him
56:50
Speaker 2: in the best way either.
56:51
Speaker 1: What would eight year old Kevin think about your life today?
56:54
Speaker 2: Oh? Man, I think he'd be super proud of me.
56:56
Speaker 1: I always think kids sort of have these vision of
57:00
Speaker 1: what their life will be like, and the differences of
57:03
Speaker 1: how they play out are really interesting to me. Did
57:06
Speaker 1: you think this was going to be the path?
57:09
Speaker 2: Well, first of all, going back to your eight year
57:10
Speaker 2: old question, it depends on what video you showed eight
57:14
Speaker 2: year old Kevin. You could show them the highlight reel
57:16
Speaker 2: of all these years and he'd be like, wow, so amazing.
57:19
Speaker 2: Or you could show them the low light reel and
57:21
Speaker 2: he'd be like, what the heck happened? Man? He can
57:24
Speaker 2: watch the whole reel now before it's just selected moments.
57:27
Speaker 2: Pick which one you want to look at, the high
57:29
Speaker 2: Kevin or the low Kevin. I like it that I'm
57:32
Speaker 2: more of a coaster now. I'm a lot of sevens
57:35
Speaker 2: and seven and a half and that's just fine.
57:37
Speaker 1: If there was a line from your memoir that outlived you,
57:41
Speaker 1: what would you want it to be?
57:43
Speaker 2: Everyone is responsible, but no one is to blame is
57:46
Speaker 2: a good one. I think we live in a victims
57:49
Speaker 2: society a lot of times. I think that being self
57:53
Speaker 2: critical is super important. I think most people think that
57:57
Speaker 2: they're a good person, but I think the most people
58:00
Speaker 2: aren't self critical. You really want to take a good
58:04
Speaker 2: look at yourself and who you are and who you become.
58:10
Speaker 2: And I think you got to poke holes in that
58:11
Speaker 2: all the time. And I think all of that is
58:14
Speaker 2: within that Everyone is responsible, but no one is to blame. Part. Yes,
58:19
Speaker 2: you were shaped by your parents, and you were shaped
58:21
Speaker 2: by your circumstances. But at a certain point, I'm going
58:24
Speaker 2: to take control of my life. And this is an
58:26
Speaker 2: infinite game and that means there's no winning and there's
58:30
Speaker 2: no losing. But I'm going to get a little bit
58:32
Speaker 2: better all the time. And that's where I am at
58:35
Speaker 2: in my life right now, is like what can I
58:38
Speaker 2: do every single year to get a little smarter, a
58:42
Speaker 2: little better, a little bit more empathetic, be a better partner?
58:47
Speaker 2: And so I feel pretty good about where the evolution's heading.
58:51
Speaker 1: Okay, you ready for some rapid fire?
58:52
Speaker 2: Yeah?
58:56
Speaker 1: How much do you tip for bad service?
58:58
Speaker 2: I never tip lower than twenty percent, even if it's
59:01
Speaker 2: really bad, Like I'm usually like a thirty percenter, and
59:04
Speaker 2: so if it's twenty percent, that probably means it was bad.
59:08
Speaker 1: I was a waitress, yes, and when people tipped cash,
59:12
Speaker 1: I was so grateful. Now I always try and tip cash.
59:15
Speaker 1: How much do you tip for grape service?
59:18
Speaker 2: Sometimes?
59:19
Speaker 1: Really do tip on the alcohol if you're drinking? It's
59:22
Speaker 1: very kind. Okay, the best dish you've ever eaten?
59:25
Speaker 2: That is so hard? I don't know. Weirdly, nobody's ever
59:29
Speaker 2: asked me that question in my entire life.
59:32
Speaker 1: How about a memorable one? Because best is hard.
59:34
Speaker 2: There was a dish that just caught me at the
59:37
Speaker 2: right moment one time and had more umami, and it's
59:41
Speaker 2: probably any dish or had my entire life. It was
59:44
Speaker 2: warm nashiki rice, and then it was room temperature beef tartar,
59:50
Speaker 2: and then cold hakkaido uni at the top in one shooter,
59:56
Speaker 2: and it was freaking magnificent.
59:59
Speaker 1: A food you secretly don't like.
1:00:00
Speaker 2: I don't like corn ships. I hate corn ships. I
1:00:04
Speaker 2: hate the smell of them. I really like Freedom's corn ships.
1:00:08
Speaker 1: The best food city in America, Okay, I want to
1:00:11
Speaker 1: qualify this because food to me is not just food.
1:00:16
Speaker 2: Food to me is a combination of hospitality, and it's
1:00:20
Speaker 2: a combination of atmosphere and design, and it's a combination
1:00:25
Speaker 2: of actual food. I'm super biased, but the alchemy of
1:00:30
Speaker 2: those three things. I don't think anybody does it better
1:00:32
Speaker 2: than Chicago. And I am in love with the food
1:00:37
Speaker 2: in so many cities, and I think it variates between
1:00:41
Speaker 2: Chicago and New York. But right now the second, I'll
1:00:43
Speaker 2: give it to Chicago.
1:00:44
Speaker 1: I love that you said that because I think about
1:00:46
Speaker 1: this a lot.
1:00:47
Speaker 4: Yes, and New York has an array of options Chicago
1:00:52
Speaker 4: doesn't have. Yes, Like, you can have incredible Jamaican food
1:00:56
Speaker 4: in New York, incredible Indian food like and there's a
1:00:58
Speaker 4: bunch of spots you could go to, but the service
1:01:00
Speaker 4: isn't the same as in Chicago.
1:01:02
Speaker 1: Everybody is kind mostly.
1:01:05
Speaker 2: Indeed, yeah, mostly, It's like I do think that Chicago
1:01:10
Speaker 2: is a no bullshit town, and so I think when
1:01:14
Speaker 2: people are giving great service is because they really want
1:01:18
Speaker 2: you to have a good meal. And I think people
1:01:20
Speaker 2: feel that's scharity. They digest it, it becomes part of
1:01:24
Speaker 2: the meal.
1:01:25
Speaker 1: Something everybody should try once writing their own life story,
1:01:29
Speaker 1: whether they publish it or not, sit down, strip all
1:01:33
Speaker 1: the coats of varnish off of it and write your
1:01:36
Speaker 1: life story.
1:01:37
Speaker 2: You will learn a ton about yourself in your place
1:01:39
Speaker 2: in the world.
1:01:40
Speaker 1: Has it freed you? A book that changed your life?
1:01:43
Speaker 1: Something you think everybody should read?
1:01:45
Speaker 2: The Tender Bar by J. R. Moringer. I think he's
1:01:48
Speaker 2: a great writer. It's a great coming of age story.
1:01:52
Speaker 2: It's a great story about a relationship between the people
1:01:56
Speaker 2: who raise you and your actual father and what's more
1:01:59
Speaker 2: important having somebody who loves you there and sometimes that's
1:02:03
Speaker 2: a team of people.
1:02:05
Speaker 1: Grab the question of reading card game, please and pick
1:02:07
Speaker 1: whichever card calls out to you.
1:02:09
Speaker 2: What compliment do you hear the most? Which means the
1:02:13
Speaker 2: most to you, and which one makes you the most uncomfortable.
1:02:16
Speaker 2: I get a lot of compliments about speaking. I speak
1:02:20
Speaker 2: a lot to groups or at small tables. Just yeah,
1:02:24
Speaker 2: the way that I talk to people. I think that
1:02:26
Speaker 2: one means a lot to me. My whole purpose is
1:02:29
Speaker 2: to make people either feel more comfortable, or feel motivated,
1:02:33
Speaker 2: or feel better about themselves. And if all those things
1:02:35
Speaker 2: happen and I'm able to do that just with words,
1:02:37
Speaker 2: that makes me really happy. Feels the saying stuff about
1:02:40
Speaker 2: my hair my whole life. I shaved it off recently.
1:02:43
Speaker 2: I had like long hair my whole life. I think
1:02:45
Speaker 2: that probably makes me uncomfortable. My business partner, when we
1:02:48
Speaker 2: won the James Beard Award, actually said the first thing
1:02:50
Speaker 2: I'd like to thank is Kevin's hair. It's opened up
1:02:54
Speaker 2: so many doors for us.
1:02:56
Speaker 1: Kevin, thank you. I'm just going to say, it's not
1:02:58
Speaker 1: just on behalf of me. I think think you've opened
1:03:01
Speaker 1: so many doors in this book for healing for people
1:03:04
Speaker 1: with all sorts of pain. So thank you for your
1:03:08
Speaker 1: deep honesty.
1:03:09
Speaker 2: You pulled a real Barbara Walters on me and made
1:03:12
Speaker 2: me cry gohole time here today. That doesn't happen very often,
1:03:16
Speaker 2: But yeah, I'm glad we have some real talk. You know.
1:03:19
Speaker 2: The one thing in life that I'm completely allergic to
1:03:22
Speaker 2: a small talk, really small talk for a living. I
1:03:24
Speaker 2: ran a front door for so many years of my life,
1:03:26
Speaker 2: and that distance from the front doors to the table
1:03:29
Speaker 2: is almost always about small talk. You can only get
1:03:32
Speaker 2: into so much during those times. So everything outside of
1:03:35
Speaker 2: the restaurants, I never want a small talk. I want
1:03:37
Speaker 2: to get right into it. Let's do it, religion, sex, relationships,
1:03:42
Speaker 2: all the time of subjects, let's talk stuff, all the stuff.
1:03:46
Speaker 1: Did you have any go tos for small talk? Because
1:03:49
Speaker 1: the weather is the worst one.
1:03:51
Speaker 2: I try to stay away from the weather. I always
1:03:55
Speaker 2: thought if you ask people a question with a question
1:03:58
Speaker 2: mark not a period, you get a real answer.
1:04:01
Speaker 1: Yeah.
1:04:01
Speaker 2: So the one I would always do is I would
1:04:04
Speaker 2: just be like, how's your life right now? And if
1:04:07
Speaker 2: you really ask, like you cared about it, sometimes be
1:04:09
Speaker 2: able to take it like, you know what, it's pretty great,
1:04:12
Speaker 2: And I'd be like, well, tell me what's so great
1:04:13
Speaker 2: about it? So then the follow up question, they're like,
1:04:16
Speaker 2: you know what, it's pretty great because my son just
1:04:19
Speaker 2: went away to college. He's really happy about his choice.
1:04:22
Speaker 2: I'm like, that's fantastic. Let's celebrate that tonight. So it
1:04:25
Speaker 2: would lead to a dialogue piece to where if they're
1:04:29
Speaker 2: in a bad mood and something just happened, let's try
1:04:31
Speaker 2: to make it better. And if they said something great,
1:04:36
Speaker 2: let's figure out how to celebrate that.
1:04:37
Speaker 1: That's a good tip. Okay, you know what time it is.
1:04:46
Speaker 1: Today's a good day to have a good day. I'll
1:04:49
Speaker 1: see you next week. The band