You Should Have Said Nothing

Dear Miss Manners: In a casual restaurant, I spotted a friend’s husband dining with a female companion to whom I was not introduced when I greeted him.

Although I had fallen out of regular contact with this friend, I did know that she was out of town at the time and that her marriage had been undergoing rough times. So I thought I was doing her a favor by informing her of the “sighting.”

Upon hearing the news, she acted quite flustered and confided in me that she did have interests in other men herself and was “relieved” to hear of her husband’s dalliance.

To my surprise, that was the last I ever heard from her. She has refused to return my phone calls and her husband has received me coldly since then. Should I have said nothing?

Gentle Reader: Yes, you should have said nothing. Have you really not yet figured that out?

Miss Manners is sorry you were disappointed to find that your favor did not have the desired effect of upsetting your friend. Personally, she would like to believe that the two are a happy and faithful couple who found it an immense joke that you were titillated by seeing the husband with his sister-in-law, but are not about to let you come nosing around again.

But of course, Miss Manners doesn’t know. Neither do you, which is why it is a good idea not to insert evil conjectures into other people’s marriages.

Dear Miss Manners: Is it really true that my husband and I should be prepared to pick up the tab any time we invite someone to join us for an evening out?

Because of this misunderstanding, our social life has become very quiet. We simply are not in a financial position to be so generous; nor is entertaining at home always an option, as we both work full time and we’re often tired in the evening.

Gentle Reader: A great many people’s social lives have become noisy over this issue, and it is not happy noise. People who have been stuck with bills they don’t expect do not always become as retiring as you have.

The misunderstanding comes from the confusion between two distinct social events.

In one, a person or couple entertains friends in a restaurant, rather than at home, usually for such reasons as you cited. Those invited are guests and do not pay the bill.

In the other, people meet for a social dinner together at a restaurant. Nobody is the host, nobody is a guest, and they split the bill.

These evenings sound remarkably similar, don’t they? And the invitation to the former often comes out as if it were a suggestion for the latter. Miss Manners advises you to stop thinking of yourselves in terms of issuing invitations and entertaining.

There is a difference - not enough, perhaps, but a difference - between “Let’s meet for dinner some time this week; is there any place special you would like to go?” and “Would you join us for dinner Saturday at Chez Bistro?”