By Jackson Santy ’13
CO EDITOR IN CHIEF

I’ve never been good with good-byes.

It’s not that they make me sentimental or teary eyed—I’ve just never quite grasped the art of a farewell.

But as it is customary for exiting editor-in-chiefs of The Roundup, the time has come to say it.

However, I still have at least 104 more words to do so.

If there’s one thing I can say while still on this soap box The Roundup has given me, it would be that we live in a world with way too little kindness.

So many of our lives are surrounded with negativity, self-absorption, apathy and just plain mean people.

This epidemic of nastiness can be tied into almost any issue that has plagued society.

Violence, ideological polarization, economic inequality—those issues and more all tie back to the fact that kindness sometimes seems almost nonexistent in our world today.

Small acts of kindness can change the world.

And you, you freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors, can start at Brophy.

Sit next to someone who’s alone for lunch, or just say “hello” to them. You’d be surprised how much influence that one word and facial motion can have on somebody’s day.

Reach out and help someone who you’ve never met before pick up their dropped books.

Don’t treat your friends like commodities, value them and treat them with the dignity and generosity they show you.

Don’t be the last in class and the first to leave, stick around after the bell and help push in chairs instead of lining up at the door.

When you see a container of ranch dressing on the floor of the Great Hall, throw it away.

Smile at and thank the Michaels workers, the maintenance staff and the Romley administrators, they may not teach you what you need to get a five on your AP exams or how to get into Harvard, but they labor each and every day to provide 1,270 adolescent boys with food, keep Brophy a pristine and sound environment and make everything run smoothly inside these walls.

Don’t stand idly by when you see a student being bullied, either to his face or behind his back.

The most important thing: don’t do these acts for self-serving purposes; do them because you are a member of the community and on a larger scale, the human race.

You may not be able to end violence throughout the world or settle the never-ending hostilities between parties of differing ideals or achieve economic utopia, but you will make somebody’s day, maybe even your own.

From day one of freshman year, Brophy preaches the motto “Men for Others,” but no matter how much they do so, it all comes down to how you choose to act for others.