Miss Manners: Visits may offer compassion

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My father was recently diagnosed with a terminal illness. We have set up a website for friends and family to visit for updates, but we need a polite way to ask that phone calls and visits be limited.

We want to ensure that the time my mother and father have left together is not spent taking “prying” visits or calls.

GENTLE READER: Certainly you can tell would-be callers that your father can receive visitors only at certain times, and if they overstay, you can gently say that you appreciate their coming, but think your father had better rest now. You can even say that he is unable to receive visitors at all.

But Miss Manners urges doing this judiciously. Of course your parents want time together. But when you dismiss visits as “prying,” you discount the strength that the compassion of others can provide, both now and later. Far more difficult than regulating visitors is being isolated by indifference.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband sent out my daughter’s birthday invitation to someone she had pulled from her list. How do I un-invite this child?

GENTLE READER: It depends on how bad you want to make the rejected child feel, and how much you want to teach your daughter that her whims are more important than other people’s feelings.

Otherwise, Miss Manners would point out what an excellent opportunity this is to develop graciousness.