Ah, the ear splitting, mind numbing shrieks of children hyped up on sugar and the anticipation of Santa’s impending visit. People pushing and jostling one another, stealing parking spaces and waiving at each other with only one finger. Yes, it’s that time of year when everyone’s emotional margins shrink to the size of a mortgage broker’s Christmas bonus (as in zero, nada, zilch), and we all wish people would be nicer to us than we are being to them. During the hurried pace of the holidays little things like saying, ‘excuse me’ to walk past someone in a crowded area, or ‘please and thank you’ or, my personal favorite, ‘no, you go first’ can be overlooked. We’ve all done it or had it done to us.
Children, are never too young to learn to say, ‘please and thank you’ even if it comes out in garble, I don’t know of anyone who would turn one down. A smile is free and for employees, it is mandatory to give one to each and every customer you come face to face with while doing business. For we adults, well, we could always use a brush up so here is a list of do’s and don’ts to make the season brighter.
1. Send a thank you note. Again, send a thank you note.
2. Respond to your invitations whether or not they say; R.S.V.P. Again worth repeating-respond to your R.S.V.P.!
3. Say, ‘yes, please’ or ‘no, thank you’.
4. Be appreciative. You don’t have to be invited back next year.
5. Reciprocate.
6. Be punctual.
7. Be flexible. You may have to sit in an odd place or be asked to move.
8. Be gracious.
9. Smile until it hurts, then smile some more.
10. Talk. You weren’t invited to be a bump on a log. This applies to children. They can respond when someone says, ‘hi’ to them when mom and dad are around.
11. Bring a gift.
12. Hold open a door for someone else.
1.Don’t arrive empty handed.
2.Don’t criticize; a gift, the food, the decor, other people, your host/hostess.
3.Do NOT bully the wait staff.
4.Don’t get drunk.
5.Don’t reveal the amount of your Christmas bonus if you were fortunate enough to receive one and don’t announce to the world if you weren’t.
6.Don’t be the center of attention.
7.Don’t be a motor mouth.
8.Don’t guard the buffet table.
9.Don’t hit on the opposite sex.
10.Don’t dress trashy. Don’t be fashionably late. It’s not fashionable and the hostess really doesn’t like it.
11.Don’t arrive early. If the invitation says 7:00p.m. do NOT arrive at 6:45. You don’t know what could have gone wrong that day and your hostess/host may be finishing up and you would only interrupt her as she would feel obligated to entertain you causing her to get behind and possibly still be setting up when everyone politely showed up on time.
12. Do not forget to send a thank you note.
Bonus round. Unless specifically invited, ie. please join us for a FAMILY FRIENDLY party at our house on… for some reason, there is a current trend for parents to drag their children to every adult gathering they attend. Please, do NOT do this with out calling your hostess first to see if the party is age appropriate. If children are invited, this does not constitute a free for all and parents should take this opportunity to sit their children down and explain that some behavior that is acceptable at home is not acceptable in public. We do not: interrupt adults when they are talking unless it involves blood or fire or imminent bodily harm and/or death. We do not spit out food we don’t like onto our plates and proceed to complain loudly about it’s taste. We do not put our feet on their furniture. We do not yell or scream. We do not chase their pets, eat our boogers or pick fights with our siblings. We DO say: please and thank you, yes, ma’am, no ma’am, yes sir, no sir, please pass the _____, may I have another_____.
If you are entertaining and you have small children and/or pets, hiring a baby sitter for your children and those of your guests would be a thoughtful gesture, and of course if we attend a party where the hostess has graciously done this for us we ALWAYS offer to chip in and/or tip the babysitter.
Pets should be locked up in a spare room or bathroom with a note on the door to please not let them out. Yes, they are your fur babies, but some people may not like animals and may not be used to them doing THAT to their leg or begging from the table.
If etiquette continues to be a mystery and one which you would like to decipher, I really, REALLY, encourage you to sign up your child for cotillion. I had the very distinct pleasure of interviewing the man who created the John D. Williams cotillion program, of course, Mr. John D. Williams himself, that started here in Colorado Springs at the Broadmoor Hotel and is now nation wide so, if you live somewhere else and are interested in this wonderful program, please inquire with them about classes in your area.Mr. Williams was such a pleasure to interview. I don’t mind telling you I developed a wee bit of a crush on him, and he was in his early 90’s when we spoke. He passed away shortly there after but he left quite an impression on me and that was after only one meeting and he was competing with a view of Pike’s Peak from the Garden of the Gods Country Club patio while gorgeous thunder clouds were rolling in for an afternoon storm. Whew!
This was also my second meeting of a talented lady by the name of Connie Armit who at the time headed, and may still, the cotillion program. Her late husband had said that although he played and loved sports, especially hockey, he never had an opportunity to use his hockey skills in his adult life but he used what he learned in cotillion EVERYDAY. Ok, parents of kids in sports, let that sink in a bit. Your child has a 100% certainty of interacting with people on a daily basis and the impression he makes on people will have a huge impact on how successful he’ll be, not only in business, but in life. The chances of him making it onto a major sports team is low. My point? If you have the money to do cotillion AND sports, go for it, but if you have to make a choice, go for cotillion. People with good manners go farther in life and have more doors opened for them, no pun intended,than those who don’t.
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