it had been a long hard road the sexual abuse he suffered at the hands of a babysitter when he was nine , the fights he had with his mom when he became a teenager and blamed her for it , moving out at sixteen , living on the streets , swearing hed never go back , getting a job , crashing with friends , paying friends back and getting his own apartment , finally seeing the wow-you-are-really-talented look in their eyes when he played his first gig at the whiskey .