Dear Etiquetteer:
When do you offer to have something cleaned because you've spilled and when do you just apologize profusely?
Dear Etiquetteer:
This . . . this is a painful query, because Etiquetteer once, all too memorably, spilled a great deal of red wine all over a lady’s ice blue satin pantsuit. (You may read about that here.) That it occurred near the end of intermission at a theatre only heightened the tension. In the confusion, Etiquetteer surely said “I am SO SORRY! Please send the bill to me!” But you may be sure that the next day Etiquetteer had a dozen roses delivered — wine red, of course. (Is it worse, or better, to spill on someone you already know? Etiquetteer is not quite sure. This experience was humiliating in the extreme.)
So there are degrees of magnitude. If you spill a bit of red wine on a white tablecloth and immediately cover it with salt (the Perfectly Proper solution), no offer to dry clean need be forthcoming. Etiquetteer thinks of table linen damage as the Price of a Good Time for the hosts. Spilling a full plate of lasagna or guacamole or cheese dip on the carpet, however, requires remuneration. But since it is also extremely rare for the schlimazel* actually to send a bill, flowers or a Thoughtful Gift with a Perfectly Proper Lovely Note of Contrition should follow the very next day.
Dear Etiquetteer:
I have to sound off about being polite when it comes to your food sensitivities. I'm in [Insert State in the Pacific Northwest Here]. Everybody's got some food they can't or won't eat (gluten, dairy, sugar, meat, etc.). Mine is garlic. I don't go into anaphylactic shock but it makes me very ill, usually at 1:30 AM. I don't make a big deal about it unless it's someone I know very well. But I've seen people who seem to get angry or those who look and act so hurt that they have nothing to eat because the host didn't telepathically know about their food issues.
If I'm not sure about the menu I eat before I go so that I'm not starving. If I can ask in advance and they're serving the Feast of the Twelve Fishes in garlic sauce, I decline the invitation.
Friends of mine host a Christmas gathering every year and they had a guest insist she must have gluten free food. They spent extra money and time making sure she had something to eat, and then she didn't even attend. In my training, I learned the trick of pushing your food around the plate to make it look like you've eaten. You just have to make sure no one notices.
Dear Gustatory Again:
It's great that medical science has kept people from dying by learning more about food allergies. Etiquetteer has a lot of compassion for those who must be extra-rigorous about what they do (and don't) consume, because that level of vigilance must wear a person down.
But this new knowledge has led a few bad apples to consider the world their restaurant where they can order what they want, and how to prepare it, with impunity. People forget that private hospitality is extended (and accepted) for the pleasure of one's company first. The refreshments are incidental. Yes, of course it's disappointing to be invited for a meal and not be able to eat it, but the meal is only the framework for the real purpose, connection and conversation.
What’s the most Perfectly Proper response when invited to a dinner you can’t eat? Grin, bear it, and keep on talking. Ellen Maury Slayden remembered inviting a Senator and his wife to a dinner at home that turned out to be inedible because the cook was having a bad night and the butler used paraffin on the salad instead of salad oil. Oopsie! But the Senator “stayed him with flagons and comforted him with salted almonds**” and kept telling amusing stories that Mrs. Slayden said “diverted me from my humiliation.***” What could be more Perfectly Proper? Etiquetteer feels sure the Senator and his wife managed to find something to eat at home later.
The non-appearance of your friends' Insistent Gluten-Free Guest dismays Etiquetteer. Unfortunately this gives a bad rep to Responsible Gluten-Free Guests who do show up after making their needs known. The word "insist" is what dismays Etiquetteer most. If you aren't even going to come, why make such a fuss? That person would not be invited back to Etiquetteer's house, you may be sure.
The Perfectly Proper language, by the way, if pressed on why you are declining a dish (and it's rude to ask why to begin with), is to say only "It disagrees with me" or, in extreme instances, "It disagrees with me violently. I'd rather not go into detail." No one really wants to know about what happens at 1:30 AM after a garlicked entrée.
Etiquetteer wishes you a Perfectly Proper and Perfectly Palatable evening.
*Remember, it’s the schlemiel who spills the chicken soup, and the schlimazel on whom the chicken soup is spilt.
**Mrs. Slayden was paraphrasing Song of Solomon 2:5, “Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples . . . “ Note that this was in the era when nut dishes were common on formal dinner tables.
***Washington Wife: The Journal of Ellen Maury Slayden 1897-1919, edited by Walter Prescott Webb