Miss Manners: Bride may choose which parent accompanies her

Dear Miss Manners: What do you do when your only daughter has her mother (a redneck) escort her down the aisle instead of her living father? The mother is the force behind this.

As a young couple, the two divorced early. My brother went his way, and she did also. Over the years, he supported the child monetarily and not as much physically.

Her mother’s side is more controlling. As aunt and uncles, we all sent gifts, but all went unrecognized. We have excused this with lack of manners from parents.

Should we lower ourselves as rednecks and take care of them in a restroom? Or pretend their actions are a slap in the face to our family, especially my brother, who did the best that he could as a young dad and adult? It leaves me to believe that they are vindictive and money grubbers.

Please help me understand their ignorance. Your comments and suggestions are important and much needed.

Gentle Reader: It strikes Miss Manners that what is needed is a security guard in the restrooms.

Her suggestion is that you all calm down and not hurl charges of ignorance (along with other insults) that could better be used against you.

Galling as you will find this, having the parent who actually reared the daughter give her away at her wedding is traditionally correct. With two parents in the house, it was the father, but the underlying idea was that the bride had been living under his protection, and he was about to transfer custody to the bridegroom.

Now we all know that today’s bride does not care to consider herself in need of either such protection. But if she likes the anachronistic custom, she need not scurry to find a male to do it. In the absence of a custodial father, the mother is not an improper choice.

Dear Miss Manners: I work primarily with teenagers, a vocation whose rewards are vast, and I had the privilege of speaking on behalf of one of my teens at a ceremony. During his response, he presented me with a gift.

While I believe he was sincere in the giving, I suspect his parents, particularly his mother, who is both thorough and gracious, had a hand in the decision to present the gift and in its choice.

I have written a thank-you note to the young man, since he presented the gift; however, I wonder, because I see his parents’ hands in this, if I should write them a note as well. I do not want to undermine his role in this by assuming the gift was not from him.

Gentle Reader: Then don’t send home a note indicating that you knew he could not have thought of doing this on his own. It would not only belittle the son, but would indicate that the childrearing has not been entirely successful if the young gentleman cannot bring off such a gesture convincingly.

Miss Manners never discourages people from writing kind letters. But this one should congratulate the parents only on the manners of their son.

Readers may write to Miss Manners at MissManners@ unitedmedia.com, or via postal mail at United Media, 200 Madison Ave., 4th Floor, New York, NY 10016 or (in black or blue-black ink on white writing paper) to Miss Manners, in care of The Spokesman-Review, 999 W. Riverside Ave., Spokane, WA 99201.