Relationships
Join Meredith Goldstein at the Boston Public Library for a conversation about centuries of advice
Kelly Chan
You’re reading Meredith Goldstein’s Love Letters newsletter. Each week, Meredith shares tales of human connection, thoughts on public policy and relationships, and behind-the-scenes stories about the Love Letters column and podcast. Sign up to get the dispatch.
First, an event announcement.
You know about the Tell-A-Booth at the Boston Public Library. Now you can sign up for an event all about it.
On June 30th at 6 p.m., the library will host “The History of Advice, From Columns to the TELL-A-BOOTH, with Meredith Goldstein and Mary Beth Norton.”
It’ll be an evening of discussion, laughs, and community gossip.
Norton is a historian who wrote the book, “I Humbly Beg Your Speedy Answer: Letters on Love & Marriage from the World’s First Personal Advice Column.”
That means we’ll get into advice from the 1600s to now. Turns out people hated their inlaws back then, too.
The event is free, and you can sign up to attend right here.
I am so excited to talk about our phone booth and more. Please come.
Now, some links.
- If you listened to our explainer on the Phone Booth, you know that one sports fan visiting Boston left a very long message about loving (and hating) the Knicks. I didn’t know how to answer the sports-love question in the column, so I asked my friend Dan Shaughnessy for help. Enjoy what he had to say as the Knicks’ season continues.
Ruhama Wolle. Photograph by Tatiana Katkova
- Dinner With Cupid, the often hilarious matchmaking column in The Boston Globe, can be hit or miss with romantic pairings. But I love when editors set people up who wind up becoming friends. This blind date could lead to real connection – of the platonic variety.
- If you’re enjoying the spooky-yet-funny Apple series “Widow’s Bay,” which features Jeff Hiller, you might want to revisit the Love Letters episode about him. When he recorded our episode, he happened to be in town to film an Apple show. It was “Widow’s Bay,” as it turns out.
Jeff Hiller and Kate O’Flynn in “Widow’s Bay.” Apple TV
- Finally, in Love Letters … timing is everything, right? A letter writer who’s about to move meets someone right before leaving. If you find someone great at the last minute, do you stay? Continue on with your plans? I told this letter writer to stick around for a bit. Most commenters did not agree.
Remember, you can send your own anonymous letter, about any kind of relationship, by clicking this box.
What’s your love and relationship problem?
Ask Meredith at Love Letters. Yes, it’s anonymous.
I’ll leave you with a photo from a recent WBUR “Yelling Bee,” during the WBUR Festival.
It was a spelling bee – with yelling.
WBUR/BOLT
I lost this event. I was eliminated on the first word —“unanimous” … a pretty easy word! I just typed it without having to think about it.
Lawyer and Former Massachusetts First Lady Diane Patrick (left) won first place. Coming in second was “Top Chef” contestant Laurence Louie, center, who did know how to spell “julienne.” At the right is Candice Springer, associate director of WBUR CitySpace, who is kind enough to laugh with me, but not at me.
— Meredith
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