“Choose Drugs” is the 3rd Track off of Juliana Hatfield’s 4th solo album, Beautiful Creature. An often underrated album, Beautiful Creature is one of my favorites. It has so many fantastic songs, like this one, that has stuck and stayed with me ever since I first listened.
“Choose Drugs” by Juliana Hatfield
from the album, Beautiful Creature (2000)
Song of the Day
“I say it’s me or drugs,
you choose drugs.”
This song is sometimes very hard to listen to, yet it is one of my favorite tracks by Juliana Hatfield. It brings up old hurts of a past relationship that shattered, and the enormous loss that came with it.
The battle was brutal, cruel, and I suppose futile, but I fought it for years. I would scream, cry, beg, plead and sometimes just smile and pretend it was all okay, pretending, as well, that he would choose me, and us, instead. It hurt more than I have words to say that he never did.
It also brings up the reality that with few exceptions my relationships have been shadowed by the presence of drugs in my partners. It somehow always gets in the way, hurts what we have, and eventually becomes something I have to be responsible for. Whether it’s dealing with the consequences and downfalls or being the one who has to say enough, or please stop.
I wonder what it is about me that continues this trend. Is it a co-dependency in my personality? An enabling nature in me? Is it a pattern created by what is familiar? Or is it embedded in my DNA, a legacy of depression, anxiety, and addiction coursing through my veins, helping to navigate where I land?
Is there a way to stop the pattern? Is it something I need to fix in me? If so, what is it exactly? Maybe I just need to focus on myself, what I do and don’t do, and keep striving for being happy in the present, mindful, grateful, hopeful, and focusing on love.
