The fact is, my parents loved me, and I wanted to be worthy of their love. I wanted to make them proud.

I was going to get the Carolyn Bessette story out of her one way or another.

We’re all pretty ordinary on paper.

I wanted to grow up to be just like my father.

I’d been around women who put me down, made me feel bad, or said things to fuel my insecurity.

I too have my own demons, and I have struggled. I’ve made my own mistakes, and I’m not proud of them.

I’d gone to Manhattan to become a model.

I spent two weeks prancing around a studio in Queens in my underwear with nine other guys. They were long days. But what the hell, it was Calvin Klein.

It struck me that what I’d heard about certain celebrities was true: they had It, whatever the hell It was. Star power isn’t a myth; it is tangible and forceful.

The fact is, my parents loved me, and I wanted to be worthy of their love. I wanted to make them proud.

Calvin had finally taken a look at the ET tape, and he had reacted just as she had expected he would. He loved it; he loved me. Suddenly he was thinking of me for everything: underwear, jeans, suits, even the Escape fragrance campaign.

I wasn’t even 20 at the time, but it taught me something about drugs. They can take a good man, a warm, funny, loving family man, and turn him into a loser and worse.

My father was a sergeant with the Connecticut state police. My mother was a hairstylist.

A father’s disappointment can be a very powerful tool.

Thank God for little miracles, right?

I began to believe the fairy tales: You know, how we’re all out there looking for our magical missing half.

I like parties, but I’m shy, and I often find myself standing around, feeling awkward.

We live in a kissy society.

The people on Baywatch were about as nice a group of people as I had ever worked with.

New York is tough on lonely people.

I wanted to marry a girl just like my mom.

I didn’t know a damn thing about style.

By the time I was 8 years old, sports had pretty much taken over my life.

I guess that’s what I was: a set of abs. And they lit the abs and shot the abs and sent the abs on their way. The photographer didn’t look at my face once. I was humiliated.

What was it about Carolyn that made her so cautious about revealing herself?