Juliana Hatfield's Bad Boy Decisions

Here's an excerpt from Chapter 16: Cool Rock Boys:

Sam was ten years younger than I was, a talented (but penniless) guitar player, singer and songwriter. When we started dating I said to myself, "Haven't I learned anything from my mistakes? I'm an idiot — a fool — to get involved with Sam, another cute, poor guy in a band, and so much younger than me on top of that."

Sam was starry-eyed when we met, as was I, though Sam's star had not yet risen. I saw potential (for musical greatness, and for disaster). And I think he saw in me some kind of idealized fantasy version of womanhood (pretty, thin, semi-famous, financially solvent). In the very beginning, Sam, in the throes of new, young love, said to me, "Let's get married." I declined to play along. I said, "Sam, wait six months and then ask me again. I guarantee you won't still want to marry me then. I'll bet you a million dollars you won't."

And then I thought, "I know exactly how this is gonna end."

I even told Sam my prediction: "Sam, you're gonna leave me for a model one day. Just wait." I would repeat this every few weeks, as a way to preemptively save face — to let Sam know in advance of when it happened that I'd seen it coming; so that when he dumped me, I could pretend it wasn't a shock, or a big deal, or a humiliation, and that I had even had a hand in my destiny.

Sam would counter with, "No way, Jule, you're gonna leave me. I'll never leave you." And for a while, he believed what he was saying.

But he sounded less and less convinced as time passed and the months turned into a year and the year became a year and a half.

And then he left me for a model. A model/actress, actually.

I did have a hand in my destiny. I picked the ones that I knew would ripen quickly and fall off the vine in a relatively short cycle. The fruit would go bad and I could taste the rot in my mouth and yet I kept eating. Was I a masochist? Or were bad boy decisions a way for me to avoid getting too deeply into anything very serious and painful? Was it because I felt no one could ever really love the real me (because I felt essentially unlovable) that I made sure to choose the ones I knew never had a chance to begin with?