I know our campus is on a hill, but we don’t always have to be climbing up.
A couple of Thursdays ago, I found my shoes sticking to the adhesive floor at Loretta’s Last Call and thought to myself, “What the hell am I doing right now?” I had a meeting at 9:00 a.m. the next day, I had 50 movies on my watchlist that I’d been dying to sit down for on a nice quiet night, the only people I was interacting with were the same ones I see in my common room, and every drink cost north of 10 bucks. What. The. Hell?
I think I might get a lot of pushback for this article, but what do I care? I’m on the back nine of these college links anyway. So, with that wisdom, I’m going to make this statement:
As Boston College students, we possess an unyielding tendency to do things that we might not want to do because everyone else is doing them. Our mob mentality makes us social climbers rather than true friends.
The best friend roommate from day one. The club that’s going to provide us with friends. The boyfriend or girlfriend who gets along with all of our friends. The perfect Foster house for junior year. The best internship for next summer. The Nashville fall break. That mod gameday photo—even when we don’t have a mod.
Oh yeah, and let’s make sure to somehow post it all in a timely fashion. Let’s prove we actually went, and let’s prove to ourselves that these “what-am-I-doing-here” memories are actually the ones we should cherish because we finally feel like we fit the BC standards. I know our campus is on a hill, but we don’t always have to climb up for “cool” social status. I really wanted popularity to end in high school.
Typically, there are about 10 to 15 guys and 10 to 15 girls per friend group. And there’s one or two that call all the shots. The “queen bees” or “quarter-backs”—QBs if you will. They’ll tell everyone through a text what they’re doing over the weekend, why they’re doing it, and who else is going to be there. This text is followed up with a heart from the QB’s direct roommate which prompts the rest to follow. Some of the guys see the text knowing they would just sit around in their common room all night otherwise, so they’re in. One guy responds on behalf of all his roommates.
Next thing you know, everyone is at Circle only talking to their individual friend groups because you can’t intrude into someone else’s hive other than saying a mandatory but brief “hi.”
And, if you somehow manage to escape the hive for the night, you typically catch flack the next morning in the form of passive-aggressive guilt trips or backlash.
“Why didn’t you come out with us last night?”
You may want to reply with: “Oh I don’t know. For one, I just wanted to watch a movie. Secondly, I’m not exactly swimming in funds. Three, if I’m talking to my friends, I’d prefer to hear them instead of shitty bar music. And lastly, I can’t bother with the hook-up drama of our friends who don’t even care about each other.”
Yet, you know that sting would be more of an issue-causer than a problem-solver, so you bite your tongue and reply with the classic, “I had a lot of homework this weekend. I’ll be there next time.”
Maybe I’m just fortunate enough to have a few really good friends, but those conversations I could be having at the overcrowded bar with the 10-dollar cover fee and 10-dollar drinks have always felt shallow and unfulfilling to me. Very rarely do I leave Cityside thinking, “Wow! I feel like I know so-and-so much better now.” And I know for a fact other people have this feeling too. It’s just not one we like to discuss openly.
Yes, there is fun in going to a bar, an off-campus basement, a Walsh party, etc. In fact, I’d even go so far as to argue that every now and then we all need to let loose in this way. But often at this school, going to these places feels more like social climbing. It’s performative—a chore we have to do to “make our rounds” and say our hellos while making our friends look “cool” and ourselves look pretty.
There’s nothing cool about not doing what you want to do, and more people need to understand this. My truest friends are my truest friends because they let me be me. They do not care if I go out on a weekend or not. Obviously, they care when I’m not their shoulder to cry on or there for their club event that they desperately need people to go to. They care when I don’t show up to the lunches and dinners they keep inviting me to, but it’s never about the times I don’t go out with them.
I know before we all got here, and even within that first month of school, we had this picture-perfect idea of what BC was supposed to look like. The roommate. The club. The date approved by the whole friend group. There’s something about this campus that just makes us want it all. But, that can’t control our true friendships. Because, I hate to break it to you, you’re probably not going to find it when you’re masking your true self with cologne and perfume.
Real relationships take time and effort, but you have to be willing to put that time and effort in. The only way to do so is by controlling yourself.
Honey might be sweet, but a beehive isn’t. Lucky for us, there might be a maple tree not too far away. We just need to seek it out a little more.
