By KAREN HILL
Spring Weekend has finally arrived, and it is time to party with your friends for the last time before you all become distant and stressed inhabitants of the Walsh Library.
While this a fun time of celebration with your friends, time for friends is often sacrificed for finding hookups or spending time with your beau. Spring Weekend or not, this balancing act of friends and relationships is never easy nor fair.
The first way to even out time between best friends and boyfriends or girlfriends is to rally up the posses. Have your friends and their friends all hang out as one. You can all get ready together before heading out to the main events.
The fact of the matter is that it is healthy as a couple to hang out with all your friends and get to know each other. This process only works, however, if you and your lover stop using your mouths to make out in the corner and instead start conversations with the group instead.
Sequestering yourself as the “cutesy” couple in the corner is only going to frustrate your friend, and create a lasting distance.
Cooling it on the PDA is essential. People are not thinking in their heads, “aw, what a cute couple;” they are thinking, “ew, will they please stop.” Call your friends jealous all you want. It’s true that jealousy is not a flattering trait in anybody, but provoking jealousy is ugly.
Think about it: do you really need to hold hands everywhere you go, showing off? Despite your “puppy” love, you are not a dog with a high possibility of getting loose. You are a human being with self-control. Enable the self-control and restrain the PDA that may make you feel special, but simply makes everyone else feel uncomfortable. That’s a little lesson in utilitarianism from Philosophical Ethics for y’all.
One of the shadiest things you can do as a friend is just leave with your love of the night. Before you leave, say your goodbyes and make sure your friends have someone to walk home with.
Also, as the single friend you should not walk away leaving your friend alone with their boyfriend, girlfriend or whomever unless they give you the “getting lucky wink” of approval. Maybe your friend isn’t comfortable being left alone, or actually does want to spend more time with you.
As a boyfriend or girlfriend you have to be understanding and trusting when your partner wants more friend time. If your girlfriend wants a quality girls’ night out, let her. If your boyfriend wants to play FIFA for a night, let him. Group hangout sessions are strictly mutually planned in advance, not an annoying “Hey, can I join?” self-invitation.
The bottom line is that single friends need to respect those in relationships and those in relationships need to respect friends who are single. We are college students, not mind-reading psychics. Be honest. Be receptive. Be a good (boy/girl) friend.
