Around the year 1 C.E., the Roman poet Ovid followed up "The Art of Love," his dating manual in verse, with an antidote titled "Cures for Love." Among the recommendations are to pick up a hobby ("cow bulls into submission"), distract yourself with a new partner ("as they split off into many a stream, mighty rivers lose muscle"), and, if possible, take a trip at once: "Don't fake an excuse, either, for sticking around. Don't check the calendar. Don't keep looking over your shoulder back at Rome."

This past summer, I did the bidding of the ancients and booked a seat on the Berkshire Flyer-Amtrak's seasonal train from Penn Station to Pittsfield, Massachusetts to get some distance from my own romantic disappointment. A few weeks earlier, I had been dumped by a man I was seeing-and by text, no less. Even the rake Rodolphe had the decency to add a drop of water to his breakup letter to Emma Bovary, hidden in a basket of apricots, to make it look as though he was inconsolable. Yet does that spare Emma's feelings? When the basket arrives and her husband invites her to smell the fruit's sweet aroma, she shouts, "I can't breathe!" With respect to breakups, the message is the message.