THE HELP
The properly run household, as Miss Manners knows any proper person will be grateful to hear, has a minimum of five indoor departments: The pantry, which is the special province of the butler—who actually presides over the whole household, as his demeanor plainly shows; he runs it with a staff of footmen whose minds are on the housemaids. The kitchen, run by Cook with the help of the scullery maids and the cooking sherry. The public and private rooms, run by the housekeeper with a staff of parlormaids, chambermaids and their assistants, all of whose minds are on the footmen. The laundry, with at least one sweaty laundress doing the linens under the querulous supervision of the housekeeper; and the family wardrobes at the finicky direction of the lady’s maid and the valet.
The nursery, if there are small children, ruled by the iron hand of the governess or nanny; or, if there is an elderly person, a nurse and companion of decayed gentility, run by the iron hand of the elderly person.
It has two outdoor departments:
The grounds, run by the head gardener.
Transportation, under the direction of the head chauffeur.
One of these two, but seldom both, are observed to be much too confidential with the lady of the house.
Even back in the days when everybody who didn’t have a servant probably was one, it was acknowledged that households could run more or less properly with fewer people. Over the course of the twentieth century, Miss Manners has noticed, the number of people deemed necessary keeps decreasing. In the early decades, it was thought that perhaps one could make do with either a butler or a housekeeper indoors, a combination driver and gardener outdoors, and a depleted cast of assistants. By the time of the Depression, one maid-of-all-work was thought to be able to do it all if she weren’t so shiftless. By midcentury, it was widely believed that a housewife ought to be able to manage the indoor departments with a weekly cleaning woman, while the gentleman of the house managed the outdoor departments. Then it was a housewife who, unless she was shiftless, would not really need to employ a weekly cleaning woman or bother the gentleman of the house. Now it is the lady and gentleman of the house who are supposed to be able to perform these tasks in their spare time after work, while a single mother ought to be able to manage it alone if she weren’t so shiftless.
What has remained pretty much constant, Miss Manners notices—besides the excessively rude custom of insulting hard-working women—is the amount of work. Since the promise that electric appliances would replace human effort was not made good, and the prediction of perfect robot servants keeps being pushed into the future, here is the way a proper modern house is staffed:
The pantry, run by the lady and/or gentleman of the house, assisted by petulant children, answering machine or voice mail to mind the telephone, kindly neighbor to take in deliveries and bring in repair people.
The kitchen, run by the pizza delivery person, assisted by the microwave, the carryout and, for special occasions, the catering service.
The public and private rooms, intermittently run by the cleaning service who run by the vacuum.
The laundry, run by the dry cleaners.
The nursery, run by the day care center, the au pair girl whose mind is on the equivalent of footmen, or the foreign nanny whose ideas of children-rearing differ from the parents’; or the nursing home, for care of the elderly.
The grounds, under the care of the lawn tractor and leaf blower.
Transportation, run by the carpool and public transportation.
Miss Manners does not see much progress here, or even much of a bargain. All these years, she has been saying that everyone would be better off if household work were treated with respect and respectable working conditions. Perhaps it is time people listened.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – Regarding one’s servants: How much should they be paid? Should any be paid more than another? What, if any, benefits should they receive? Should any receive more or better benefits? How many days vacation should they have? How many hours a day and how many days a week should one’s servants work? Should they be expected to work day and/or night, weekends, and/or holidays?
Should one’s servants be expected to work during their or their family’s or their friends’ special occasions, such as birthday, anniversary, graduation, play, recital? Should they be allowed extra days off to travel for holidays and special occasions? Should one ever treat one’s servants as friends or as family?
GENTLE READER – Miss Manners remembers you. You’re the one who made the so-called “servant problem” the staple of female conversation for all those boring generations. How did you get a modern postmark on your letter?
We now realize that what we had there was an employer problem. Domestic work, not being treated with the dignity and the humane measures demanded of other employment, is not what you would call a major job attraction. Those who undertake it should be cherished. By that, Miss Manners does not mean that they are to be treated as family or friends. People who are willing to clean your house might not be as eager to be your friend. Socializing with the employer should not be a part of any respectable job.
What is wanted here are the decent job conditions associated with any honest work: agreement on job requirements, higher than minimum wages for higher-than-minimum labor, such benefits as sick leave, paid vacation and reasonable leave for family duties and personal emergencies, a regular five day, one-shift schedule, holidays, extra pay for overtime, merit raises, retirement, and so on. These are what Miss Manners (who comes from a family of labor economists) considers to be a basic minimum. Miss Manners does not suggest your approaching any prospective employee with your ideas until they have been adjusted accordingly.
When Miss Manners first bravely set out into the workaday world, a mere slip of a girl timidly hoping to earn her bread and to be of use to society, the young had certain obligations to their professional elders. Such as waiting on them hand and foot. The indenture system had already been abolished, although it was sometimes hard to tell, but both respect for the senior members of the workforce and education for the junior members were still supposed to be furthered by such service.
Naturally, Miss Manners had aspired to a respectable occupation, so in her youthful wisdom, she chose journalism. There she soon found that the chief tasks of newcomers were maintaining the sacred tools of the profession (sharpening pencils) and the equally sacred welfare of its notable practitioners (fetching sandwiches). Indeed, this labor did produce wisdom, although the entire education, along with a hint about the degree of respect to be accorded, was passed down within the junior ranks by means of a single sentence:
“Be sure to collect all the money before you go out and get the sandwiches.”
In due course, Miss Manners attained a modest amount of seniority of her own. When the day came that she would have liked to conjure up a sandwich, the system had changed. “They’re not your servants, you know,” she was informed about her immediate successors. What’s more, she could jolly well sharpen her own pencils.
Miss Manners actually agrees with the idea that labor’s bottom ranks should have more clearly defined limits than the most exalted positions, so that the most vulnerable workers are protected from exploitation. She just didn’t care for the timing.
“They’re not your servants” is an excellent thought to keep in mind when dealing with all employees, and never more so than with those who work in one’s house. It was on the home front that the fantasy of devotion and personal attention between employee and employer most dramatically failed. The ideal was that of a loyal worker who had the same sense of responsibility for the employer’s household as she had for her own, coupled with empathy that made her understand her employer’s special needs and preferences. She would be loyal and flexible enough not just to get the job done as stated but also to pitch in when that was needed. The employer, in turn, was supposed to be appreciative enough to supply voluntarily the working conditions and benefits of workers with more bargaining power, along with a more general sense of responsibility and empathy for the employee’s welfare.
Such employees and employers did actually exist, but not dependably, and seldom were they paired with those of equal commitment. So—whether it was that the help turned ornery or just wised up—the old personal service business has been put on a less personal basis. Some of the abuses of the old system are now gone, along with its advantages.
Household help is increasingly likely to consist of contractors—not only a cleaning service, delivery service, car service, catering service and so on, but services that supply such formerly lady-of-the-house services as sending letters and presents. The truly personal aspect, the devotion and continuity that produces that increased understanding and therefore even more pleasant service, is a rarity.
The job requirements and limits are as articulated as in an office, and no one in either kind of workplace should be able to sustain the illusion that catering to extra whims is sufficiently compensated by the education or emotional satisfaction that gives the employee. Not even those who grumble because they got caught in the change.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – We have a wonderful cleaning woman who has worked for us several years. We value her highly, thank her sincerely, and pay her handsomely. But she wants more. She wants to be friends. Miss Manners, I do not want to be her friend, any more than I would want to be friends with the pediatrician, the auto mechanic, the accountant or the mail carrier. I do not wish to appear heartless or rude, but I expect such people to solve their own problems and to look for companionship elsewhere. How does one politely convey such a message without coming across as mean-spirited?
GENTLE READER – The etiquette between household employer and employee has always been muddled in America, where the euphemism “help” was invented out of our belief in social egalitarianism. We expect more compassionate and dignified behavior than in the harsh, class-bound master-servant relationships of less democratically rooted societies.
We just can’t figure out what it is. Miss Manners’ own dear aunt was startled to find that her excellent cleaning lady had taken to greeting and taking leave of her with a social kiss, but was at a loss for an objection that wouldn’t sound demeaning. Making friends, or pretending to do so, is hardly the solution. If your friends are so good as to clean up after you, you would insult them by offering to pay, but would be obliged to look for opportunities to clean up after them.
Did your cleaning lady but realize it, she would be worse off as your friend. You probably wouldn’t be able to give her the quality of help she gives you. She also doesn’t really want you messing in her love life or her spiritual life, as old-fashioned employers and modern friends are wont to do. You certainly don’t want her messing in yours, considering that she has the run of your house and is of necessity privy to many of your private habits.
What is required (but almost never found nowadays) in a cordial business relationship is not forced friendship but pleasant professionalism. Someone who works in your home cannot be treated as formally as someone with whom transactions are transient, brief and public, but you can stop personal conversation at the first sign with such regretful statements as “I’m sorry, but I’m busy,” “I really don’t know anything about that,” “I wouldn’t presume to advise you” and “I won’t keep you from your work.”
DEAR MISS MANNERS – Several months ago, I hired a friendly, hard working, reliable woman to help clean my house. She speaks only Spanish, and normally this is only a minor inconvenience, since I speak tolerable Spanish and she is very forgiving of my grammatical mistakes.
However, I’ve noticed that when other people are in the house, the situation is a little awkward. When her name is mentioned in conversation, it seems obvious that I should include her by explaining the comment. On the other hand, when my daughter and I are huddled over her math paper, there seems no need to translate everything into Spanish. When I make a pot of coffee and offer a cup to a friend, do I translate that it’s half decaf and the cream and sugar are on the table? When my friend and I burst into laughter over some joke, do I try and explain in Spanish? I realize that ours is a business relationship, but I don’t want her to feel excluded.
GENTLE READER – Miss Manners dares say that your housekeeper would prefer to get on with her work so that she can enjoy her free time as she chooses, rather than delaying it by listening to your and your friend’s translated jokes. Privacy works both ways: Surely you would not intrude yourself if she had a visitor.
The point about translating anything in which her name is mentioned is an excellent one, however. You should not be discussing your employee in front of her, but if her name comes up—as for example if you are mentioning that she will soon be picking up your daughter from school—it is tactful to let her know what was said.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – What should a housekeeper wear as there are so many different duties from formal serving to sweaty work?
GENTLE READER – Where did you find this gem? Miss Manners knows people who do formal service and she knows people who do sweat-producing housework. But the only people she knows who do both also have to pay the rent or mortgage on the house.
The evening uniform for a waitress is a plain short black dress, which is also what all the female dinner guests are wearing these days. The waitress at least gets to dress hers up with white apron, collar and cuffs. The uniform for anyone who does sweaty work is whatever that person feels like wearing. Inevitably, this means a T-shirt, jeans and sneakers, which is unfortunately also what all the brunch guests are wearing these days.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – When I had friends from my office to my home, a woman guest complimented me on how clean and neat my house was. I explained that my husband deserves all the credit; he’s my full-time housekeeper. He’s totally comfortable in his role, and I’m satisfied with our lifestyle and work arrangements. A few of my female friends didn’t quite understand and were rather disturbed by having a husband as a housekeeper. Do you feel I handled the situation correctly? What would be the correct name for a male housekeeper?
GENTLE READER – Unlike your friends, Miss Manners believes that most ladies would call him a treasure. You are right to be proud of him, and are not responsible for their negative nosiness.
You are responsible for your own, however, and you are not doing much for your husband’s pride by calling him “my” housekeeper. Households belong to all those who live there, and whatever division of chores is agreed upon, the responsibility is also shared. Speaking of him as if you presided over the household, and had merely contracted with him to do the cleaning, is rude. The fact that many ladies have been so spoken of by their husbands for maintaining the family hearth does not make it excusable.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – When I was a child and invited to friends’ homes to play, my parents did not permit me to go if they didn’t know their parents and were not offered opportunities to know them. At the time, I felt that they were hurting my social life, and I resented it.
Now my five-year-old daughter is receiving invitations from the parents of her classmates for her to come to their homes for a visit. I have chatted with these women at school, and felt that potential friendships were developing. However, the invitations don’t often include me. I resent this practice. I know I am feeling rejected by these women. I am a stay-at-home mom and I’m fairly new in the area. My only social contacts are other moms. I can handle that, I think. My real concern is my reluctance to send my daughter into a home I’ve never visited with people I don’t really know, at an age when she is not yet ready to take care of herself. There is so much in the media these days about children dying in shooting accidents in a friend’s home, and children being molested in situations where their parents are not there. I am genuinely scared.
How do I handle these invitations without hurting my social chances, or hers, and without inadvertently sending her into a situation she is not yet ready to handle?
GENTLE READER – Miss Manners is afraid you are trying to deal at once with two different problems—your daughter’s social life and your own. Protecting her, which is certainly your duty, can be done without requiring that all her friendships be two-generational.
There is no offense in the wisdom of asking who will be supervising the children while they are at play. If it is not a parent but some other caretaker, you are justified in chatting with the mother or father about that person. They are apt to be quite frank, the virtues and drawbacks of such employees being a major interest of working parents. Such a talk may very well lead to friendships. But since you do have the advantage of being at home, Miss Manners doesn’t see why you don’t solve both problems by inviting the parents and children to your house, where you can observe them at leisure for signs of trustworthiness to supervise your daughter.
It used to be said that you could always tell an upper class background from a person’s manners, especially the table manners. They would be simply frightful.
The premise was that people who were rich enough to have nothing to do with their own children wouldn’t. So while the parents displayed their fine manners at grand dinners and goodness knows where else, the children ate with the servants, picking up their manners and goodness knows what else.
Miss Manners has noticed a few things wrong with this offensive little formula. To begin with, where were those upper class parents supposed to have learned their own manners? Then there is the odd idea that manners are related to the circumstances of birth, rather than training. It’s best not to get Miss Manners started on that mean triumph of snobbery over experience. Suffice it to say that the servants of an aristocratic household would be excellently versed in etiquette.
Mostly, it is a slur on the traditional nanny, who devoted her life to the noble, if doomed, task of teaching children to behave better than their parents. If it is difficult to learn the lesson that one must love and respect one’s parents while they set bad examples, it is even harder to teach.
“Yes, I know Mummy likes to smash her champagne glass when she gets hilarious,” Nanny would say with a straight face. “You, however, will drink your milk properly and take care where you put your glass.”
The modern nanny (or au pair, or housekeeper, or day care provider) has a different situation. The children still don’t eat meals with their parents, but that’s because neither parents nor children actually sit down and eat meals; they’re too much on the run. Far from wanting to get away from their children, the parents cherish their time together so much that they don’t want to dampen it by giving instructions and corrections.
The result is not as different as it should be between aloof, frivolous parents and those who are devoted and overburdened. They all expect an employee to set their children a higher standard of behavior than they are willing to enforce. Miss Manners is afraid that this is never going to work. The parents may be angels and the employee may be a Godsend, but unless they make a team effort, the children are going to be neither.
Working parents are familiar with the orientation session between employee and supervisor, but something funny happens to them on the home front. Maybe this is the sixth nanny they’ve had, and if she doesn’t work out, the family is going to split up fighting over who can more easily take off from work. Perhaps cultural differences make them afraid they might unknowingly offend. Or they think it all goes without saying. So they often slur over explanations of what they expect—rather a startling omission, considering that this is the most complicated, delicate and important job they will ever hire anyone to do. Child care inevitably deals not only with feeding, clothing and scheduling but with guidance in morals and manners, so it should not be offensive to go over this in detail with someone who is expected to do a good share of the teaching. It becomes offensive when this is done without leaving an opening in which the nanny can explain her own ideas and requirements. Anyone competent to do such a job will have opinions about how it should be done, and will know that it cannot be done if the employer engages in sabotage. Even such tender sabotage as allowing the children lower standards of behavior when Nanny isn’t on duty, and calling it relaxation or quality time.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – What does “au pair” really mean? Do we not have an English word that means the same, or is this just another attempt to distinguish the “wealthy” from the “lower classes”? Although I know the difference between housekeeper and nanny (another recent term being used in the U.S.), I have seen housekeepers, nannies and au pairs all doing the same job—taking care of children and cleaning house.
GENTLE READER – Miss Manners has seen lots of people doing what you describe, who are called mothers, fathers and grandparents. As she understands the usage, it is not the job that is being described, so much as the commitment of the person who performs it.
We don’t really have an English equivalent of “au pair,” which seems to mean “young foreigner who wants to come here to have a good time, which her employers hope won’t be in conflict with the reason they brought her over, but don’t want to squelch so much that she gets teary and homesick.”
“Nanny” is understood to be a more serious person, trained and motivated more by an interest in children than the opportunity to have a rent-free social life.
“Housekeeper” is what people used to call a maid. Someone finally realized that there was something wrong in assigning a dismissive title to someone who did the same job that her employer would be honored for doing.
Attributing snobbishness is dangerous, because these terms are less likely to be chosen by the employers than the employees themselves, whose wishes polite employers respect. Besides, Miss Manners is reluctant to pick on people while they’re trying to make their households function. They look far too desperate.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – When a formerly active person finds herself—because of age or permanent disability—no longer able to live alone and hires a live-in companion/sitter, how is this person to be considered—as an attendant or maid? Or is she to be considered as a friend of her employer and therefore a friend of her employer’s friends?
For instance, when Mrs. Employer (let’s call her Mrs. E) is invited to her grandson’s wedding, does her companion/sitter/attendant (let’s call her C) sit with the family? When E is invited to a luncheon in a restaurant, is C expected to attend? If so, who should pay for her—E or her hostess? When E is invited to a birthday dinner in her honor in someone’s home, is C one of the guests? When E herself entertains, is C a guest?
Please explain the difference between a paid companion, a sitter and an attendant. I realize that this sounds rather crass, but C is, after all, a paid employee, not someone living with E because of family relationship, friendship or love.
GENTLE READER – As Miss Manners understands it, a sitter is someone who comes in temporarily to administer small comforts and generally keep an eye on the employer’s (or the employer’s relative’s) welfare; an attendant is someone in a permanent position, perhaps with some nursing skills; and a paid companion is an impoverished relative struggling mightily with the moral temptation of doing the employer in, with the simultaneous objectives of being relieved of a nuisance and remembered in the will. Perhaps Miss Manners has been reading too many turn-of-the-century novels.
The question of how that person should be treated in the employer’s household is a difficult one, as the old etiquette conventions of such relationships have been confused by the admirable modern prohibition against treating anyone as an inferior. Generally, the best arrangement for both parties is that a companion is treated as a member of the household, while an attendant or sitter keeps a private social life, even if needed to convey E to her own social engagements.
Whatever E and C work out, it should be done openly at the time the employment begins, to avoid such disappointed expectations as C’s thinking of herself as a member of the family only to find that she seems to be a servant, or, conversely, feeling that she has taken on the round-the-clock obligations of a family member, rather than the limited employment and personal privacy she had wanted.
When E is invited out, C may welcome a few hours away while E’s friends are around her to tend to her needs. If C must remain professionally in attendance, she is offered a seat near her charge, and whatever food is served is provided by the hosts, and she is engaged in enough small talk so she does not seem snubbed, without its being so much that she seems expected to perform. If, however, E and C live on terms of friendship, above the necessities of the case, and go about socially together, then C becomes a full member of the social circle, with the guest’s standard obligation of making herself charming to her hosts and the other guests. The difference is conveyed to other members of the alphabet who have no other way of knowing, by E’s saying either “C and I go everywhere together; I’m sure you’ll enjoy getting to know her” or “C will bring me, but don’t worry about her; she has things to do if you can find her a quiet place.”
All householders believe that it should be the ambition of every adolescent in the neighborhood to earn a dollar by devoting his or her free time to baby-sitting, raking leaves, walking dogs and shoveling snow.
Not only would this teach the young generation the value of money, but (Miss Manners is given to understand) it would build their characters. If they can manage to do all of these activities at once—without letting the dogs and the babies torment one another, or allowing the snow removal to interfere with the leaf raking—they might stand half a chance of growing into responsible citizens. Especially if they stay out of the refrigerator and throw in a free car wash.
It is a sign of teenage truculence that this labor supply claims to have other things to do. Miss Manners has been scornfully told that the alternative activities they claim to have, questionably grouped under the general name “homework,” are only listening to loud noises and lurking idly.
In an even more indignant tone, it has been reported to her that nowadays teenagers expect to earn more money. Never mind the fact that they can command fortunes because they were born with the ability to understand computers—doesn’t that just go to show you how seriously their characters are in need of construction?
Everybody knows that the cost of living has risen over the years, but we all also know that there are certain items that should be exempt from price changes. That candy bars cost a nickel is the firm belief of every middle-aged person, and the reality is a fresh shock no matter how many trips are made to the vending machine. A bookseller of Miss Manners’ acquaintance has so wearied of customers’ remarking bitterly “Why, I remember when paperbacks used to cost thirty-five cents,” that he has taken to replying, “So do I, and I also remember that you earned three thousand dollars a year then.”
Teenagers know nothing of those innocent days, as Miss Manners feels obliged to remind their would-be employers. So it is only kind to offer them the reasonable employment conditions of the era in which they live because they have no halcyon memories to compensate them for modern life.
These include not only reasonable current wages, but reliable working conditions. Agreement must be reached on the exact working duties, as in any job, but with the added realization that it cannot be taken for granted that relatively inexperienced workers know what to do, much less how an individual employer wants it done. If on-the-job amenities are negotiated—refreshment and the use of electronic equipment being the most common—those, too, should be specific.
Furthermore, the employers should be fair. If a job turns out to be significantly different from what was contracted—if the snow turns to ice in midjob, or the child had to be tended through an emergency—compensation should be adjusted.
When Miss Manners hears of grown-ups who don’t meet their payrolls promptly, making the excuse that they forgot to go to the bank, or who don’t come home when they promised and therefore force conscientious baby-sitters to disobey their own parents’ instructions, she wonders what that generation is coming to. And she tries to think of some form of hard labor that might help build their characters.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – My son’s trombone teacher comes to our house every Friday evening for an hour. I love the convenience, but I don’t want to get as personal as she seems to want.
First, she wants to chat, for example, about what went on at my doctor’s appointment (the reason I had to move our normal time). At that time of day I am exhausted, and hungry, and need to start dinner. Do I owe her conversation? I’d rather she just taught music and got it done with. Second, she seemed to want me to wait on her. The first appointment, she asked for a cup of coffee. Then milk. Then a second teaspoon, then a refill, then could I take it away.
I suppose I should mention that she is wheelchair-bound, so helping herself is really not an option. But instead of relaxing, I was hopping almost the whole hour. And I paid her for the privilege! I was infuriated, but didn’t say so. However, the next two weeks, I made myself very busy doing laundry in the basement. She hasn’t asked for tea since. Was I out of line? Do I need to treat a music teacher as an honored guest, with treats and attention?
GENTLE READER – As you know from 19th-century novels, a teacher who gives lessons in the household is accorded quasi-social status. This leads to all sorts of complications, such as the noble widowed father’s marrying the poor governess and the impetuous daughter’s running off with the French dancing master.
Miss Manners trusts that this puts your problem into perspective. All you need do is to greet the trombone teacher pleasantly, quickly announce “Well, I’ll leave you two to your music,” as if you knew they were eager to have you out of the way so they could start, and leave the room.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – Our mother, 58, still beautiful, witty, bright, a published writer, and recently widowed, is job hunting. But she is looking in the want ads for a position as housekeeper, cook or personal maid! We are in distress, all seven of us. Our father left our mother with two houses, a houseful of furniture, two cars, and $1600 per month. No bills except for taxes and living expenses.
Our mother feels service is not demeaning. She loves to cook and run a house. She could make up to $1800 per month, plus room and board. She would just like to immerse herself into a cozy home for a couple of years and save her salary.
We are not looking forward to introducing our mother to friends as “The cook for _________” or “ ________’s housekeeper.” She might even end up working for the parents of friends in our social circle! Is this a supreme folly on our mother’s part, or are we being stuffy?
GENTLE READER – Stuffy? No, that’s not quite the word that comes to Miss Manners’ mind. Could it be “insufferable”?
In contrast, your mother sounds splendid. Miss Manners doesn’t need a housekeeper (and warns the millions of people who do not to write in, because she doesn’t have your mother’s name or address), but she would like to have such a wise and gallant lady as a friend. Your mother’s pluck in turning bereavement into a chance to be of service to others, in the way she happens to choose, is as fortunate for her own happiness as it will be for the lucky recipients.
Miss Manners does not understand what you mean in your cracks about “service.” She dares to say that you did not consider it demeaning when your mother cooked and cared for you. She does, however, understand your fear of having your mother find employment in your own social circle. With your attitudes, you may well suffer by comparison when your friends get to know her. Surely that is more than compensated by the pride you will have in being able to introduce such a lady as your mother.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – I have no doubt that the expression “You can’t find good help” is a valid complaint but I have some suggestions for keeping a good one once you’ve found one. I have a house cleaning service which for the most part is problem free. Even the problems that do come up are easily solved. Simply put, there is enough business that I don’t have to work for rude inconsiderate people.
This is a job. I know it looks like fun but this is my means of making a living. A time is reserved for your house to be cleaned and you need to honor that arrangement. Sure there will be last minute cancellations due to sickness and other valid reasons (on both sides), but last minute cancellations should be rare. “I was in the mood and cleaned myself,” “My house isn’t very messy this week” or “My mother stopped over for a visit and it’s not a good time” just don’t cut it.
Then there are those who don’t cancel but make it nearly impossible to clean. Yes, I understand that you should take your turn for the neighborhood preschool playgroup but having them over when I’m due to clean is not a good idea. Having groups of friends or relatives over makes it very difficult. Some things can’t be avoided but if your home is like Grand Central Station you may be cleaning it yourself.
Though most people just give me a key there are those who are uncomfortable doing that. If you forget to leave your door unlocked, I lose income. These things happen—but don’t just shrug it off with “Oh, well, we’ll see you next time.” You’d better at least pretend you’re sorry and give assurance it won’t happen again. Because I understand doesn’t mean it’s ok to do—be prepared to pay anyway. I overlook the first time only.
You plan ahead weeks or even months for a vacation; wouldn’t it be nice if I knew ahead of time, so I could use that time for appointments or doing extra work for those I already work for? I provide a flexibility to make room for special occasions and needs of those I work for. I do practically any job and am good at it. I’m honest and reasonable. I provide the services because I WANT TO not because I can’t say no.
While it’s true some may behave as they do because of a mistaken view that “she’s just the cleaning lady” most start out considerate enough and after a period of time feel they can get away with being rude and inconsiderate. People often mistake my good-naturedness and easy-going way for an indication that I am a door mat and a pushover just waiting to be used and abused. When they are forced to see their mistake they seem so offended. I’d just love to know the reasoning involved in their attempts to blame and otherwise turn the tables making the user and abuser a victim of unkind or unfair treatment.
If the only thing preventing one from taking advantage of me is opportunity—they’ll get it but once you make it known you’re that sort of person I’ll be your excleaning lady!
P.S. I won’t even get into the piggishness of some.
GENTLE READER – Miss Manners would say you already have. In whatever state they keep their sties, people who treat their household employees callously have certainly attained a state of piggishness. Miss Manners found your rules eminently fair and she admires both your flexibility and your firmness. The only thing that made her stop short was your suggestion that a reason that the employers don’t treat housecleaning as a serious job may be that it looks like fun. It is surely easy for them—easier than they might think, as you point out—to dispense with your services and keep all the fun for themselves.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – I hired a woman I know who lives down the street from us to clean house. She came down the evening before she started and we went over what to clean and what to leave. The following day, she cleaned and did an excellent job, or so we felt at the time.
The next morning, my husband was having a shower and noticed that our shower door was all streaky. It seems that she cleaned the door, which is especially treated, with some kind of new cleaner that ate away the frosted stripes on the inside. I was devastated. That was our new bathroom which we had just completed. She had indicated to me that she cleaned two other bathrooms with the same shower unit, so I trusted that she knew what she was doing.
I called and explained the problem, and she was nice about it and said she would pay to have a new piece of glass put in. She wanted to pay for all of it, but knowing that it would probably be around $80, I decided to pay half, even though I don’t feel it was my fault. Her fee for the day was $35, and she insisted that I put it toward the piece of glass. Should I send her the $35? Should I expect her to pay half, or foot the bill myself?
My husband was upset with me, as he didn’t feel I should have told her. Her husband won’t let her clean for me any more. To complicate things, her mother is my dressmaker (and one I treasure) and I am afraid there will be hard feelings.
GENTLE READER – If someone offered you a responsible cleaning woman, a dressmaker and an approving husband, all for an $80 finder’s fee, would you accept? That is the offer Miss Manners is making you, provided you turn over your fee to the cleaning woman, along with a note of appreciation for her offer and for the work she did.
One of the trials of domestic employment is that employers do not have the perspective common in other businesses, where the possibility of a reasonable mistake, especially in a new employee, is built into the situation. You do not want a slapdash cleaning person who treats breakage lightly. A competent person such as you describe should graciously be allowed a mistake or two.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – I clean houses. I don’t work for a service, I clean on my own. I have for five years. Many a time, someone has called me to ask where something was. They have always found it. I guess what I am getting at is that a lot of people misplace things, and when they do find them, do you think they would even say “I’m sorry”? Most people that clean other people’s homes for a living can’t afford to steal. It would cost them their job. I just had to get this off my chest.
GENTLE READER – Miss Manners will be your best ally in fiercely challenging any employer who slurs your honor by hinting that you may have stolen something that is missing. The impulse to blame someone else for one’s own lapses is rampant, but decency forbids it.
However, Miss Manners would also like to point out to you that “misplacing things” is not necessarily a euphemism. Lots of people do misplace things. (Time out while Miss Manners finds her glasses, so she can continue this.) Asking help from a housecleaner—who would have been going over the house quite thoroughly—is not an unreasonable idea. What such a person then owes you is not an apology but an expression of thanks.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – A guest at my party interrupted my hired help (while serving guests and passing food) to ask if she would work at her home at a specified future date. I feel it would be more discreet to ask me for the telephone number or approach her at another time. Interrupting a festive cocktail party to solicit help for a party of her own was, to me, socially incorrect. Am I too strong in my judgment or a bit behind in the current social graces? Or doesn’t it matter at all?
GENTLE READER – Why is it that every time Miss Manners is asked if etiquette has changed, it is in connection with a change that would be for the worse? What has changed here is that poaching the help is not quite the crime it was when people had full time help and were in fear of competing employers. Presumably, your help could help your guest on another day.
What has not changed is the necessity for discretion in soliciting such help. These people are not only interrupting your party, they are mentioning another party within earshot of people whom they are not inviting, which will never qualify as a social grace.
Help is on the way. Just stay put, don’t panic, and a repairman will be right over, sometime between eight A.M. and five P.M. tomorrow, unless they’re running behind, in which case they can’t always call, but it will be the next day, for sure, except, wait, that’s the weekend, so take it easy, someone will try to get over on Monday, can’t say what time, somewhere between eight and five, and there better be someone there to let him in.
Thus, an etiquette crisis is grafted onto a household crisis. A hitherto gentle soul, who had just managed to remain calm in a kitchen full of water, or in a house no longer compensating for the weather outside, or without means to communicate from home to the outside world, begins to exhibit panic-fueled anger in uncharacteristic and decidedly unseemly ways. Miss Manners does not justify the ensuing behavior which, at any rate, carries its own punishment. If the householder doesn’t high-handedly cancel the help he sought, thus having to begin the grim process over again with someone else, he has still alerted the rescuer that this is not a safe time to appear. But she does sympathize.
Surely one of the great trials of retaining control over oneself is to encounter the You-Need-Us-More-Than-We-Need-You Support System. Here are its rules:
You understand that we will help you in an emergency, but we will have to work you in then as best we can, because we also have to take care of our regular clients.
If you are one of our regular clients, you stand a better chance of getting help in an emergency, and you are less likely to have emergencies, because we will check things periodically.
Your appointment for periodic checks will be canceled if you are not there at our convenience.
If you are there at our convenience, you will probably have to wait because we are, by virtue of the service we offer, subject to emergency calls that take precedence.
If you don’t like this, you can go elsewhere, although you will soon find that anyone else who may help you also operates this way.
The medical profession is credited with having invented this system, but a wide range of service professions have adopted it. Those that do not include emergency duty substitute the personal emergencies of the service givers, rather than those of the clients, in order to explain why they cannot meet a predictable schedule. Now all of life contains such vicissitudes. Surely professionals in any field develop a sense of how long it takes to deal with each kind of problem, how much leeway to leave between appointments and more or less when it is possible to be where. So why don’t they tell their clients? Can’t the plumber say whether he’ll be in that part of town at the beginning, middle or end of the day? Can’t the doctor’s office call and say she’s running late and all appointments must be set back an hour? Can’t they apologize when they mess up other people’s schedules? It is enough to send ordinary people screaming for and at help.
That is just what Miss Manners is asking them not to do. The way to deal with institutionalized rudeness is persistently enough to convince the offenders that you are not going to let the matter drop, but calmly enough not to allow them to do so on the grounds that they needn’t deal with crazies.
Miss Manners understands that this doesn’t always work. That is because the set-up is rude. She is trying to shame it into changing, and to suggest that someone could compete successfully in these fields by doing business in a polite and reasonable way. She is amazed at how often it does work to appeal politely to pity, honor and greed, in just that peculiar order. Some individuals can be seduced away from rote devotion to a rude system by sobbing tales of hardship, provided they are phrased to excite sympathy rather than to confer blame. A few will rally to re-establish the honor of their company, provided accounts of its failing are phrased in terms of disillusionment rather than insult. Even the usual methods of threatening to cut off payment or to sue are more effective when they are made with measured politeness than in a fit of unfocused madness.
Those who lack the control to try these methods are free to hire a contractor—who doesn’t exactly come free but will promise to be on the spot to deal with all other services households require. The householder then only has to deal with waiting around for the contractor.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – The new home we purchased has needed constant repairs since the day we moved in. I never receive calls from the service technicians stating when they will come—they merely show up unannounced. I refuse to answer the door unless I received a prior call to inform me of their arrival. I have been branded rude because of this, when I feel I am the one who is put upon by their behavior. My husband states he is happy they even show up!
GENTLE READER – Much as Miss Manners admires you, she knows just how your husband feels. One should not put up with blatant lack of consideration, but one also wants to get the toilet fixed.
Principle is rarely the first concern of people with plumbing problems in their houses, and the power to be inconsiderate goes unchecked. As this is a service contract, the easiest way to deal with it—switching your business to a polite company, if one can be found—is probably not practical. The next steps—appealing reasonably and politely to a manager’s good will and getting other customers to make a joint complaint—take time. It is time well spent on behalf of a beleaguered public, as Miss Manners hopes your husband will understand.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – If someone comes over to do a job such as painting the inside of your house or putting in a new rug, is it rude to eat lunch or dinner in front of them? My mom says nobody should eat or drink in front of workers unless you ask them to have something, too. I disagree. If it’s in my house, I don’t feel it’s necessary, as they are not my personal friends.
GENTLE READER – While Miss Manners always admires the hospitable impulse, she fears that your mother is setting an exaggerated standard. People who are having work done in their houses must be allowed to carry on with their normal lives, rather than behaving as if they have a household full of guests.
This does not mean that the obvious needs of workers should be ignored. Lunch is generally provided to regular domestic workers, while those who come in for a limited job are merely given a lunch break. In both cases, employer and employee dine separately so as not to create a social burden for either one of them. Miss Manners assumes that you understand this does not preclude a humane gesture, such as offering water or soft drinks on a hot day.
Who is this person and how much do you have to give him to make him go away for another year? What about that one, whom you consider as much a friend as an employee—if you don’t give her what she expects, is she going to be hurt and perhaps slightly vindictive?
Is it any wonder that Miss Manners hates the tipping system? Almost everybody else does—those who give and worry that they don’t give enough or give too much, and those who receive, or don’t receive, or feel they should receive more.
Nor is Miss Manners fond of the people who keep this system alive—the businesses that appear to charge less and yet save on wages by extracting an added payment from customers; the service people who use this source of income to avoid paying taxes, or who increase it by complaining, soliciting or retaliating against customers; the customers who relish the power of dispensing rewards and punishments but who wouldn’t last long themselves if they had jobs where they were docked every time they made an error.
She also has a special reason for wishing that America (where tipping was historically disdained as undignified—until a modern citizenry decided that money was worth more than dignity) would now follow the European lead and build a service charge into the cost of doing business. To Miss Manners’ dismay, tipping guidance is considered a duty of the etiquette business. If she doesn’t do it, people turn for guidance to the very establishments and individuals who are on the receiving end—as if it were prudent to ask people with extended hands to rule how much should be put into those hands.
Yet the kind of guidance people want is impossible to give. Miss Manners could easily give them principles: 15 to 20 percent, depending on the poshness of the establishment and the unusualness of the task; bills, not change, which is to say not less than $1, even for such services as carrying your briefcase from just outside the hotel door to just inside the hotel door.
But people don’t want principles. They want figures.
“How much should I give my doorman at Christmas?” they demand, as if this were a universal problem, and not one that can be better solved by asking a neighbor what the custom is in the particular building. These are the same people who expect Miss Manners to select “the perfect present” for people they know well and she has never laid eyes on. (“What should I get my wife and my secretary?” they ask Miss Manners as the shops are closing on Christmas Eve. She advises them to get the wife a secretary and the secretary a wife.)
Another useless question is why one should have to tip certain people, such as taxi drivers, waiters and hairdressers and not others who perform similar functions, such as bus drivers, airline stewards and psychoanalysts. The answer is “Because.” Because this silly system grew up haphazardly, and so now certain jobs depend on tips to round out the wages, while in others the compensation comes complete in the paycheck.
Well, maybe not complete. There is still that extra something at Christmas for people who are not customarily tipped but should get something because they give such good service and might sulk if they’re not. It’s called a bonus.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – Each year, my condominium association sends a letter to all unit owners requesting a “voluntary contribution” to the Employee Christmas Fund. This tradition, as they call it, allows us to show (in an anonymous way) our appreciation to those individuals “who work so hard for us all year long.” I receive a similar letter from the management of a private club to which I belong.
Although I contribute to these funds because I do not wish to seem ungrateful or Scrooge-like, these requests strike me as inappropriate and, indeed, tacky. One would not expect a letter from the general manager of the law firm one employs, seeking a holiday fund contribution for the lawyers “who worked so hard on your account all year long.” Is it unreasonable to think that it should be the condominium association’s responsibility to provide Christmas bonuses for its employees? I realize, of course, that the unit owners pay for it either way, but slightly higher assessments seem more gracious than these brazen appeals for cash.
GENTLE READER – This is just a wild guess on Miss Manners’ part, but if you check the year’s accounts, you may find that you pay your lawyer more than you pay your janitor. Your comparison is therefore irrelevant: Tipping is a means of supplementing ill-paid work (even though custom has so much influenced which jobs it applies to and which not, as to make this distinction unreliable).
Mind you, Miss Manners abhors the practice of tipping, which she finds unfair to the employee, because it puts too much arbitrary power in the not-always-fair hands of the client. She actually agrees with you that it would be better to charge the condominium owners more and use that money to increase salaries or provide bonuses. However, until such time as she manages to transform the system (over the loud protests of the employees of snob-oriented businesses, where outrageous tips are often offered and not always declared on income taxes), one must cooperate. It would be Scrooge-like, not to mention wrong, to deny these workers their expected income merely because one doesn’t like the method by which this is provided.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – I engage a housecleaning service for a few hours one morning each week. My concern is about gratuities. The same young man has been cleaning my house for several months, but there were several different cleaners before that. At Christmas, do I tip only my most recent helper? In the event that there should be someone else just before, should I tip that person as well? I understand that I do not have to tip the owner of the business. I plan to give a gift certificate to an audio-visual sales and rental store. Is this appropriate?
GENTLE READER – Gift certificates are a pathetic compromise convenient to people who do not trust their judgment about selecting the right present for those whose tastes they ought to know. In the business world, employers and employees should not be expected to know one another’s tastes, so cash is given, in the form of bonuses or tips. Why limit what the recipient can do with it?
A cleaning service is an attempt to get around the awkwardnesses and insecurities of the individual householder–cleaning person arrangement. While you could tip your most frequent helper directly, Miss Manners suggests you give a sum to the owner with the direction that he or she distribute it proportionately to all of those who have been employed in your house.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – My hair stylist of 10 years has, as of this week, opened her own salon. Quickly, do I continue to tip her even though it all goes into her pocket??
GENTLE READER – The rule to which you refer—that it is an insult to tip the owner of a business—is still in effect. The only thing that has changed is that an awful lot of people no longer mind being insulted by money.
Miss Manners would prefer to presume that your hair stylist is proud of her new status. To show that you are recognizing that, rather than stiffing her, you should accompany your tipless payment with a statement about your pleasure in her success and what a privilege you find it to be attended by the owner.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – What is the correct way to tip the person who carries out your groceries at the grocery store?
GENTLE READER – With cash. Handing over a banana, or a can that rolled out of the bag, is not considered a tip.
Etiquette reports about visiting mothers-in-law may be neatly sorted into two even piles, Miss Manners has discovered. Half are complaints about mothers-in-law who invade kitchens and nurseries and simply start doing things their own way, presumably to express distaste for the way the tasks have been done or left undone. They seem to feel that they can take over the household. Miss Manners is asked to scold them for being arrogant. The other half are complaints about mothers-in-law who sit there and do nothing, seemingly oblivious to the cooking, cleaning or child care chores going on around them. They seem to feel they are there to be waited upon. Miss Manners is asked to scold them for being arrogant.
(Wait, there’s one letter left over. It’s from a daughter-in-law who wants to know how to persuade her mother-in-law to visit more often. Without actually throwing it aside as a crank letter, Miss Manners is forced to classify it as statistically insignificant.)
Before starting an in-law matching service, Miss Manners would like to clear up a few things that are puzzling her. Such as: Aren’t these the same daughters-in-law that the mothers were complaining were incapable of writing letters? Failing an answer to that: Where are all the other relatives? An occasional sister-in-law is cited, but fathers-in-law and brothers-in-law are held responsible only for their own particular messes, not for any general housekeeping. Also, where are the husband-son people while all this controversy is raging? It doesn’t take that long to pick up some milk and detergent.
So we may be talking about more than meets the eye. Even so, Miss Manners is determined not to uncover any nasty psychological stuff. The beauty of etiquette is that it is supposed to clear up conflicts at the surface level, without exposing all those ugly tangles underneath.
The proper question to which she will therefore address herself is: What, if anything, can a visiting relative do that will not be classified as either interfering or shirking? The general rules for all houseguests are to straighten up after themselves, and to offer to help with mealtime-related work, but also to accept refusals of help. The purpose is to make the mechanics of visiting as light as possible, without presuming that the work is really shared. The hosts are in charge, and reciprocal visits should even things out.
In the case of relatives, however, there are complicating factors. The ordinary host-guest relationship is skewed by the respect due to age and parenthood, the habit of instruction from parent to child and the overwhelming fact of not being able to say “Okay, that’s it, these people are never setting foot here ever again.” In addition, some individuals prefer the work-as-you-go system, by which the visitor takes an active part in the household, while others prefer the work-on-your-own-turf system, by which the sharing is done sequentially, depending on who is hostess. Attitudes are not necessarily paired in the same family.
Regardless of preference, a visiting relative must claim to be of the former persuasion while the hostess must claim to be of the latter. Thus, the proper opening dialogue is:
VISITOR: “Darling, you would really be doing me a favor to tell me how I can help you. You do everything so beautifully it looks effortless, but I know how hard you work. Besides, idleness makes me restless.”
HOSTESS: “Oh, I won’t hear of it. You just make yourself comfortable and don’t worry about a thing. I have everything all planned, and I just want you to enjoy yourself.”
This exchange cannot be skipped; those who either just start doing things or get out of the way are bound to guess wrong about what is really wanted. Neither statement is to be taken at face value. These are conventional openings from which negotiation can proceed.
Specific tasks (or non-tasks, such as “Would you be a dear and check to see if the baby’s still sleeping?”) can be suggested or offered (“Shall I run in and see what Nicole is fussing about?”). All such tasks must be limited and obvious. What gets helpful people into trouble in other people’s houses is figuring things out for themselves.
All housekeepers—good and bad—believe that their systems for doing things are logical, and anyone else ought to be able to deduce them from first principles. Of course that’s where the glasses go; no place else would make sense. How can anyone in her right mind think that the towels should be folded in thirds? However, it is beyond anyone’s power to detect a system in anybody else’s household. Miss Manners suspects that half those poor vilified mothers-in-law decided it was best to go ahead and do what seemed to need doing, as well as they could; and the other half decided that it was best not to attempt things and do them wrong.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – I am a new and single mom, and I don’t know the polite thing to do when my family (or his) babysits for me. Should I offer to pay grandparents or godparents when they baby-sit?
GENTLE READER – People often ponder why we have to have etiquette rules, instead of just letting the well-intentioned, such as yourself, follow their generous instincts. It is in order to avoid having kindly impulses blow up in kind faces. Politeness has to follow well-known custom, to avoid lending itself to misinterpretation.
Your thought, Miss Manners assumes, is that the grandparents are going out of their way to accommodate you, and that you should therefore “pay them back.” So you should, but not in money.
All parents (not just new and single, but even old and double) should do everything they can to make such occasions convenient and pleasant for the grandparents, to thank them profusely, and to do return favors for them. But the act of giving money for services dismisses their claim as grandparents and puts them into the category of hired help, which is highly likely to be interpreted as an insult.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – What are the responsibilities of responders to home burglar alarm systems—the person who is on a notification list to be phoned by the security company if the alarm is sounded?
Typically, the police are summoned to drive by, and you’re asked to go to the residence to reset the alarm. My sister had complained that a friend had given her name to the company without discussing it with her, which she only discovered when the friend’s alarm went off and the company called. So you can imagine my surprise the following week, when my sister’s home security company phoned me that her alarm had sounded. When I reached my sister that evening, after a day of trying to find her, she stated that I should “just ignore the company whenever they call.”
This summer, a neighbor, whom I had invited for coffee a day prior to her vacation, handed me an extra set of house keys along with their security number and directions, “just in case our alarm goes off.” Taken by surprise, I muttered, “Sure.”
My in-laws move to their second home for six months every year, and we’re told, “We were sure you wouldn’t mind, so we left your name …” Sure enough, they left yesterday, and today we received a call. I estimate we get three to six calls from their firm per year, which isn’t much, but timing can make the calls dreadful: Christmas Day; waking you up at 2 a.m.; during a dinner party; with a house full of guests, etc.
In addition to the imposition, what if I authorize a “police drive by” and decide to check the system first thing tomorrow morning, instead of immediately, and then find that a burglary has been committed? Am I responsible? Drive time to my in-laws is 20 minutes, so I like to think I wouldn’t ever encounter a crime in progress, but what about my neighbor, who is only a two-minute walk away?
To date, we’ve been fortunate to only encounter false alarms. But no one has explained what they expect. Shouldn’t this be discussed, and permission asked in advance to use your name and give out your phone number?
GENTLE READER – First, Miss Manners would like to congratulate you on identifying an entirely new area of manners, a subdivision, to be sure, of the ancient requirement of assisting others in emergencies, but a novel one. She hopes that it will be a comfort to you, when you are next awakened at two A.M., especially if your dinner guests are still there, to know that you have made a contribution to the field. (She also apologizes for gratuitously suggesting that you might nod off in front of your guests.)
That alarms are notoriously whimsical, given to bleating falsely just to see everybody scramble, does not alter the fact that they are there to warn of imminent danger. Who should spring in to help one in danger if not those near (such as the neighbors) and dear (as we politely designate all relatives and friends)? The designated person of trust is in the position of the executor of the will, except that the job is not done once and for all.
Miss Manners thoroughly agrees with you that they should neither be named without permission, nor have their services taken for granted. Because this is relatively new—at least in comparison with keeping an eye out for the milkman, feeding the cat or switching the lights off and on so someone appears to be at home—she suspects that offenders have not considered their obligations, but merely respond to their alarm companies’ inquiry about whom they wish to trust, without considering the effect.
So here is a new ruling: One must ask permission to list such a person, and one must offer profuse thanks for acceptance (which can hardly be decently denied among those with such obvious claims on you) and for any services that are subsequently performed. One must also provide these people with a list of what to do and where to find them, or at least where to begin looking. “Run into the house and see if you can rabbit punch the burglar and snatch back my goods” cannot be the instruction. Checking that the police have paid proper attention is what is required until the owners can be located.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – Some friends stayed in our house while we were away, and in a sincere attempt to be helpful, obviously spent many hours weeding our brick patio. Unfortunately, in so doing, they removed the beautiful mosses and other special plants I’d been cultivating there for many years, leaving a barren, weed-prone expanse.
What can I say to them? I feel I must say something and praise their good intentions, but “Thank you” is not what I feel! I certainly don’t want to scold them, but as they may again be using our home, how can I tactfully let them know that if they want to be helpful, I’d like them to direct their efforts elsewhere?
GENTLE READER – If etiquette only required people to say “Thank you” when they were overflowing with gratitude, the polite life would be a lot easier. Especially Miss Manners’. But it also requires people to give thanks for good intentions, however much the words stick in the craw, and however disastrous the results. Miss Manners has a good deal of trouble, for example, in persuading people that “This doesn’t go with anything I have—please get me what I want” is not a correct response to an unwelcome present. So you must thank them for what cannot, after all, be undone. In the unlikely event that you again allow these people to be unsupervised in your house, you could say, without reference to the past, “By the way, please don’t touch the grounds—we have complicated gardening plans for when we get back.”
DEAR MISS MANNERS – A friend asked me to live in his house for about three months for security reasons. I am happy to house-sit gratis, as a favor, but do not feel that my service should end up costing me additional living expenses, since I have my own home and am not staying in my friend’s house as a boarder. Should I ask him to reimburse me for expenses which I will incur while house-sitting, such as paper goods and food?
GENTLE READER – Additional living expenses for food and paper goods? How do you figure? Do you plan to double your eating, one set of meals at home and one at your friend’s? And, ah, wipe up twice as many messes?
House-sitting does usually offer an advantage to the sitter, as well as the householder, but generally in the form of free rent or the chance to enjoy the location or quarters, none of which you need. It can also be done as a pure favor of course. Miss Manners has the impression that you are not as happy to do this as you declare, or you wouldn’t be playing with the idea of double billing. Perhaps it would be better if you did not perform this particular favor and encouraged your friend to find someone who might be happier doing it. Even from his point of view, it is not a good idea to leave someone in charge of his house and possessions who is looking around for extra compensation.
Crime is not the only nasty possibility to be considered before offering or accepting a lift in an automobile. Miss Manners is the hapless recipient of evidence that this simple courtesy screeches into rudeness with frightening speed.
Drivers write to complain about the rudeness of people who ask them for lifts and even more bitterly about the rudeness of people whom they have voluntarily offered to drive. Passengers write to complain equally about the rudeness of drivers who don’t offer to take them and those who do.
The charge all around is being inconsiderate of other people’s convenience and money. These are not roadside hitchhikers and whatever comes down the road. These are people who start on friendly enough terms to know or share one another’s travel plans. They are friends going out together, or friends of friends meeting under a host’s roof, or neighbors with similar destinations, or members of the same congregation or organization going home in the same direction. Yet one way or another, they all end up feeling they have been taken for a ride.
Knowing something of the state of driving manners in general, Miss Manners was ready to put all this down to the popular belief that etiquette does not belong on the road because it might be a distraction from speeding, passing, darting, dodging, listening to music, grooming, making finger gestures and other traditional mobile pleasures. If people regularly leave etiquette behind as they pull out of their parking spaces, of course they will get on one another’s nerves.
On closer examination, the complaints which these people are kindly passing on to her have to do less with the state of driving than with a problem that also underlies the equally deplorable states of hospitality and present-giving. These are the twin concepts of reciprocity and gratitude that are supposed to regulate social relationships. Failing to understand them results in viewing a social situation in terms of commerce or entitlement.
Passengers ignore the cost of running a car, drivers complain, and fail to contribute to the gas or upkeep. Drivers were going there anyway, passengers assert, so it doesn’t actually cost them anything. Passengers think nothing of accepting rides all the time with hardly so much as thanks in return, the drivers report. Drivers think nothing of leaving people stranded, or canceling, or dropping them off short of their destinations, the passengers say, and have no sympathy for the danger and hardship of trying to get around when one is not fortunate enough to be able to drive. Miss Manners sees that all of them have a point, and that they all miss the main point.
In regular arrangements among acquaintances—carpools—the work and the cost should be discussed openly and divided in a way that seems fair to all concerned. Yet to treat an occasional favor as not a favor—as a service for sale, like public transportation, or as a duty that nondrivers owe to drivers—is insulting. Instead, we have gratitude, which recognizes that a favor has been received, and reciprocation, which keeps the burden distributed evenly.
Miss Manners agrees that offering lifts when one knows people who need them is a basic kindness. Obviously, the recipients cannot offer the exact kindness in return—they don’t drive. Gracefully buying the gas is one partial solution, and picking up the lunch bills on joint excursions is another. It should be noted in addition that money is not the only point when a favor has been given and accepted. If they feel it is, the passengers should stick to taxis, and drivers who expect to be paid for rides should be studying for their taxi licenses.
People who offer favors should not be thinking of getting an immediate return in kind. People who accept favors should be thinking of favors—kind acts that are a convenience, as are offers of lifts—that they can do in return.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – A friend whose children attend religious education classes where I teach one afternoon a week asked me if I could take her children back and forth. My friend has neither thanked me nor offered to reciprocate for other activities in which her and my children are involved. Each time I have the five children—my three, her two—in the car, there is bickering. There are also wrappers from their snacks left in my car. I have spoken to all five, but it hasn’t helped. How can I stop transporting her children without severing our friendship?
GENTLE READER – You might invite your friend to sit in on class the day you teach the doing-unto-others rule, but Miss Manners supposes you want something more direct.
Invoke the captain-of-the-ship rule: “You know, when I’m the driver, I feel responsible for everyone’s safety. I’m having trouble getting across to your children that when they’re in my car, they must obey my rules. Perhaps you could make them understand that—or find someone to drive them who has laxer rules.” If you say this firmly enough, your friend may not notice that candy wrappers do not constitute a safety hazard.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – I have a daughter who is just getting started in her own catering business, and another daughter who lives a very comfortable life with her husband, and they enjoy entertaining. The married sister is preparing to give a dinner party for twenty, which will include many affluent guests. Should the daughter who is just getting started in catering prepare and serve the food in her sister’s home?
GENTLE READER – Let us talk about the manners that would be required if she did, since it is not Miss Manners’ place to tell grown sisters of their duties to each other, when their parent wisely refrains from doing so. (Still less does Miss Manners want to get into the question of whether or not the hostess’s sister pays. She prefers an equal exchange of services among immediate family members, but is aware of the abuse of relatives expecting professional services to be abundantly available for free.)
The charming way to carry off such a party would be for the sister who is hostess to announce proudly that her sister is making the dinner, as if it were a favor to her, rather than a way of showcasing the new caterer’s talents. You cannot invite people to dinner with the expectation that they will sign up to buy the services they enjoyed.
Both sisters should keep in mind that it is rude to make commercial overtures to guests. Rather, only after the guests begin to exclaim how good the food is should the admission be made she is now a professional, and it must be in the tone of family news. There should be no attempt whatsoever to suggest that the guests could hire her. Even enthusiasm should not be over-interpreted—politeness requires them to praise her, even if they hated the meal. At the most, one of the sisters can write down, upon request only, the caterer’s telephone number so that serious interest can be shown by a business call after the social event. Not only is this polite to the guests, who will not feel pressured to patronize the business of their friend’s sister, but it will put subsequent transactions on a businesslike basis. Miss Manners wouldn’t imagine that your daughter wants possible clients to imagine that she goes around cooking dinners as a favor.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – If a family member from out of state stays with us for two weeks, should they do dishes?
GENTLE READER – This question can only come up with one of two types of visiting relatives: those who do dishes when you don’t want them to, and those who don’t when you do want them to. Miss Manners gathers you have the latter.
One should also factor in that relatives come in three generations. If yours are a generation older than you, the most you can do is to say, “Oh, dear, I’m exhausted, but I hate to leave the dishes.” If they are your own generation, you may say, “Do you want to wash or dry?” (Modern version: “Scrape or load?”) If they are younger, i.e., your children, you should say (not ask) pleasantly, “How about giving me a hand,” as you point at the kitchen on your way out of it.
DEAR MISS MANNERS – Recently my dear brother graciously invited me to his home to celebrate my birthday, a dinner party which some of our mutual friends were also to attend. He suggested that I arrive early so that we would have a more personal visit, which of course I was most glad to do. We live over 100 miles apart, and seldom see each other. After about an hour of “catching up,” as my brother and his room-mate began preparations for dinner, I asked if there was anything I could do to help. My hosts then produced the silver coffee service, a cleaning agent, and some soft cloths, therefore obliging me to fulfill the duties of “char-woman.” May I add that the coffee service was not used at the gathering? While I personally am not above such menial labor, it does leave one’s hygienic appearance compromised, and I did feel a bit embarrassed at the dinner table.
Is it acceptable, after offering assistance, to refuse a task that should not have remained until the last minute? Or at the next informal occasion, arrive with rubber gloves and knee pads in tow? Or do I sit by expecting to be catered to, appearing to be unappreciative of the efforts made to ensure an enjoyable, informal gathering?
GENTLE READER – Miss Manners is not in the habit of psychoanalyzing the childhood influences of people who come to her with etiquette problems, but she really does need the background to this problem. Did you grow up doing the domestic chores while your brother was excused? Do you assume, perhaps from ancient but painful experience, that it is dangerous to oppose his wishes?
Otherwise, this would be a relatively simple problem. If asked to polish the silver, you could say reasonably, “No, it’s too messy a job, and I want to look nice for your guests” and offer to do something else. If you had done the polishing, you could affectionately have prompted him to use the pot by declaring, after dinner, “After all that polishing, we forgot the coffee!” As a matter of fact, you can start doing that now. Miss Manners doesn’t accept psychological excuses for not improving one’s behavior.