
THANK YOU! ❤️
Answering questions at Boston College O’Neill Library
In many love stories time is spent together or a friendship develops that grows into romantic affection (see plot of any RomCom from the late ’90s – early ’00s for example). In your case, patience will be your best friend. As singer Doris Day said, “Que Sera Sera” (Whatever will be, will be).
Focus on being a good person. The specifics of what that looks like for any given man are less important than the basics of being a good human being. BC’s core classes in philosophy and theology have a lot to say about that, but one place to start might be Aristotle’s Ncomachean Ethics. Book II of that is about what is “good” (virtuous) in people. Two specifics, though: 1) Learn to admit when you’re wrong. 2) That thing that needs doing that nobody else wants to do? Do it yourself.
Like beauty, “best” is in the eyes of the beholder (or, in this case, the reader). My helpers tell me that while Sally Rooney’s novels tend to touch on common themes around friendship, romance, class, and more, each book offers something slightly new that might appeal to different readers for different reasons.
It’s bittersweet when a chapter ends. Your feelings make sense, they will probably continue to fluctuate, which is to be expected. You may be moving away, but your friendships won’t end, they’ll just shift. You have accomplished so much while here at BC. When you were new here, you probably couldn’t predict how many friends and memories you would make. Remember that you can handle whatever the future holds.
Studying with breaks for self-care to make the studying more effective. Getting rest, eating good meals, and factoring in whimsy too. We can only memorize and remember so much without taking good care of ourselves. Also, I find flash cards very effective.
Freedom is an important idea but in the case of Luigi Mangione (who I think you are referring to), it’s a bit tricky because we have to consider together whether or not his actions were justified, whether or not it is ethical to take a life, which forms of justice are appropriate in which circumstances, and what is the rule of law. While there, unfortunately, is not a single answer to these questions, a library helper told me that it can be helpful to take a step back and think about the broader issues that are shaping our opinions, such as justice and violence. One of my library helpers suggested that the Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace and Conflict might be a good place to start, particularly the article “Critiques of Violence” by BC Professor Greg Fried which explores religious and philosophical thinking on when violence is just vs. unjust (https://bit.ly/critiques-violence), along with articles on White Collar Crime and Political Assassinations. They also recommend checking out an entry on the topic of justice in the New Dictionary of the History of Ideas, which gives a history of conceptions of justice (https://bit.ly/justice-overview). I hope this helps!