With wedding plans in limbo, not all guests may make the cut
Dear Miss Manners:
My fiancé and I are planning to get married in August, and we have reserved everything: church, reception venue, music, cake, etc. Our wedding is going be an affair of 200 people.
With what is currently happening in the U.S., we are waiting before sending out invitations — deciding if we can still have our big wedding or will have to switch to a scaled-down backyard wedding of 50 people.
If we have a scaled-down wedding, how do we go about explaining to the guests that we won’t be able to invite all of them? Also, should we expect the wedding vendors to refund our deposits?
Gentle reader:
Unfortunately, given the rapidly changing guidelines, it is possible that the scaleddown version may be prohibited as well. While distressing, it does help with your immediate problem of whom to choose to invite and how to tell them.
Rather than risk alienating friends and relatives, Miss Manners recommends that you send out cancellation notices, expressing the hope of rescheduling, to everyone who is saving the date. This should help with the vendor situation, as well. Although many are offering refunds, it is obviously financially less devastating for them to reschedule if you are able to manage it.
In the meantime, you may want to consider getting legally married, so that you and your fiancé may enjoy the legal privileges now. Many affianced have done online ceremonies that can be broadcast to everyone — and while not a replacement for being there in person, it would be a respite from the current monotony and a way that everyone could be involved.
But then you must wait it out. If it turns out that the small backyard celebration is still attainable later in the year, issue new invitations and ask your previous vendors for refunds — or, where applicable, scaleddown versions of their wares.
You need not explain to people who are not invited to this smaller celebration. As with any small wedding, you may say, if asked, that it was just for a small circle of intimates.
Dear Miss Manners:
It is my understanding that when walking on a sidewalk, one should walk on the right side of the path. And now, with the requirement for social distancing, couples or groups should walk single-file when passing others coming in the opposite direction to allow for a 6-foot clearance, if possible. What is the proper response when people either don’t understand this or choose to ignore it? I often find myself stepping off the sidewalk and into the street or a driveway to avoid these people.
Gentle reader:
Not having the power to lock people up, etiquette can seldom guarantee that you will change another person’s behavior — only that you will have made every effort short of rudeness or force.
This is why governments get involved in pandemics. Miss Manners assures you that crossing the street to avoid someone, stepping onto a driveway and waiting, or stepping into the street — presuming that you are not putting yourself in even more imminent danger — will make your point.
Dear Miss Manners:
We moved to a new house right before shelter-in-place became the new normal. A neighbor and his family stopped by to introduce themselves and graciously gave us a lawnmower (they had bought a new one and had no need for it).
Typically, I would send a thank-you note and bring over baked goods, but I am unsure how to navigate this, given the pandemic. Is just a thank-you note sufficient?
Help! My indecision now has me at two weeks out, and I don’t want to miss my thank-you window.
Gentle reader:
First, allow Miss Manners to remind you that such a window is never closed. As you know, letters of thanks should be written immediately upon receipt of a present or favor, but the need to do so never goes away.
(Sorry. She does not mean to scold you, but she is tired of hearing from delinquent graduates and bridal couples who declare it “too late.” The later it is done, the more groveling it requires.)
In your case, it was a neighborly gesture, for which a reciprocal neighborly gesture — those baked goods — would have been better than sending a bought present. Perhaps you could leave them at their door and telephone that you have done so.
To send a question to the Miss Manners team of Judith Martin, Nicholas Ivor Martin and
Jacobina Martin, go to missmanners.com or write them c/o Universal Uclick, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.