On Saturday night, we decided to meet some friends at the opening of a new family friendly restaurant. When we walked in, the lights were dancing and you could smell the polished hardwood floors. We headed straight to a table in the back and my daughter started jumping in excitement when she saw two of her favorite friends. They immediately clasped hands and jumped up and down, unable to control their excitement.
By pure coincidence, there was a another couple sitting in the opposite corner who knew my friends and their children quite well. My daughter and her two friends enjoyed going back and forth from our table to this couple’s table. I have to admit there might have been some fast walking (ok, actually some running) involved as the girls clasped hands and darted from us to them. To be clear, this wasn’t a five star restaurant, where lights are dimmed and couples are holding hands and exchanging intimate conversation. The general atmosphere was loud and chaotic since it was the first night the restaurant had opened. Each table was occupied mainly by families, most with at least two or three children.
At one point, I walked the three girls to the restroom, and as I was approaching the bathroom door, a woman calls out to me and asks me to approach her table. There were four women sitting at the table and for some reason I thought they were calling me over for a benign reason. In my head, I thought, maybe she recognizes me or likes my shirt or my sandals. What happened next surprised me.
The woman with the white shirt and black bottle-rimmed glasses, asked me “Are these your children?”
I responded with, “Yes.” At this point, I had a feeling that this wasn’t going to be a friendly exchange and so I didn’t explain to her that only one of these girls was my daughter.
After a short pause, the woman proceeded and said, “You know you really should be raising your children better. They have been walking back and forth and it just isn’t appropriate. And plus, it is rather annoying.”
I didn’t respond. I looked at her and just walked straight into the bathroom, the girls tailing behind me ready to do their business. I stood in the middle of the bathroom, fuming, not knowing what to do with a stranger’s callous remark. I don’t know if walking away was the right thing, but I didn’t really want to respond to this lady’s allegation.
She didn’t know me. She doesn’t know how I raise my daughter. I recognized that she had made up her mind and I really didn’t want to exchange views about child rearing with someone I had only met seconds ago.
It did leave me thinking about what people will say to a stranger. Was she having a bad day? Did she decide to take it out on me and my “children” ? I really don’t know the answer of why she was motivated to say those particular words to me. I realize that my daughter and her friends might have been a little disruptive, but I don’t believe that their behavior warranted the phrase she used.
We walked back to our table, anticipating our dessert. The three girls sipped a chocolate shake from the same glass, giggling at the sight of their straws. Looking at them, I forgot the woman and her words. I saw my daughter and her radiating exuberance and knew I was raising her exactly how I wanted – with unbridled happiness.
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What would you do in the above situation? Would you walk away or respond? Has a stranger ever admonished your behavior or your children’s actions? What was your response?
Welcome! I am a lawyer turned freelance writer, essayist, and editor. On staff at Literary Mama and the co-founder and co-editor of the literary journal, The Sunlight Press, my essays and reported work have appeared in The Washington Post, The Lily, Saveur, Civil Eats, Brain, Child, ESPN and elsewhere. I am currently at work on a memoir on grief and culture and how it provides perspective on life’s ordinary graces. I invite you to appreciate the ordinary with me. I hope my daily practice of seeing the magic in the mundane helps you celebrate and find more of these moments in your life too.
I rarely take my kids out to eat but when I do, it’s to a family-friendly restaurant. To me, family-friendly means that crayons at the table are okay, talking at a louder volume is acceptable within reason, and if your child sees a friend, she can visit their table (although she can’t visit tables of diners she doesn’t know). Tantrums aren’t okay and refusing to sit when asked isn’t okay and pestering waitstaff isn’t okay.
Sounds like your kids were behaving just fine. Assholes are everywhere, alas. I’ve had people admonish me in our neighborhood pizzeria for letting my girls dance (right next to our table, and not frenetically) when Madonna came on the radio and for allowing them to play with my phone during dinner (they were finished eating). WTF?
That lady was a crank and I’d have been tempted to tell her to patronize Chez Panisse next time if she doesn’t want to see children being children.
Hey, I love Alice Waters and she’s very kid-friendly!
I know. You’re just making a point of how “proper” Chez Panisse is.
Some people just immediately react that way around children. The one and only time it has happened to us was coming back from vacation this year. An older couple were sitting in front of us on the plane and after just a few minutes the lady turned around and asked us to stop our daughter from kicking her husband’s chair. Our daughter was sitting with her legs crossed, her feet nowhere near his chair. They just assumed the movement caused for just a few moments when my husband got his computer out was due to our daughter, without even checking and reacted that way so quickly. Thankfully it was my husband who explained to her, as I would have been much less polite.
Think of lonely her life is that she feels she must say that to you. I can only imagine what she says to people she knows. I think you handled it with dignity, well done. I’m not sure I would have been as generous.
Well done for walking away. As I sit here typing this, I’m fuming on your behalf, and I doubt I would have handled it quite as wonderfully as you have.I have read many back and forth comments about parents and their kids at restaurants on forums like yelp, and it amazes me the extent to which some childless people go to make sure none of these children get out of the house. It is as if once you have children, you no longer belong in the real world until they become adults themselves. What BS. I usually attribute callous and cold remarks to their ignorance, arrogance, prejudice and sometimes even bitterness, as Christine has pointed out.
I love food and am passionate about visiting new restaurants in my city and the topic of family versus adults-only dining always comes up when reading reviews. I used to run a restaurant, so I understand the frustration of disruptive kids, but I also know adults can and should be more tolerant in a space that isn’t theirs. As you can tell I can probably go on and on about this so I will just stop right here 🙂
I find it so interesting, what would compel someone to call a mother over to chastise her, to make an enormous judgement on someone after observing her for, what, 30 minutes? To decide what is appropriate and what is not? It’d be kinda funny, if it wasn’t so obnoxious. You handled it well. I’m sure you were stunned!
Obviously she wasn’t very observant if she didn’t realize the kids were pinging back and forth between two families. And when all was said and done, and she was alone at her house later in the evening, the the replay of her words probably didn’t bring her any of the satisfaction she was hoping for. Those kind of remarks never do, when the person who makes them is honest with themselves.
I would’ve done the same thing you did. And then probably ruminated about it for the next week, thinking up all of the things I wish I would’ve said. (Don’t do that to yourself!)
I can understand if she felt annoyed (we all have different tolerance levels) but the fact that she would call you over and judge you on your parenting skills goes beyond what the situation called for. My father, who can get quite grumpy at times, was mumbling under his breath this summer about a dad who was letting his son run back and forth in the back of the restaurant, behind our table. But even he didn’t confront the father. As long as kids are not causing trouble (e.g., getting in people’s way, knocking things over), most normal people will keep their feelings to themselves. This woman seems to me someone who’s lonely or doesn’t have kids and is somehow threatened by the happy family scene that you have. People are not mean unless they feel threatened, I always believe…
I probably would have handled it the way you did – even as I read your post I didn’t know what I’d come up with. But I also like the idea of reminding the woman that it is a family restaurant. Like the other poster said, if she wanted peace and no children, there are other places to go.
This is a wonderful topic, Rudri. A lot of parents are afraid to take their kids to certain places for fear that they will act up, or simply be jubilant, active kids – which some people will be annoyed at.
Strangers often feel empowered to speak without information, and without invitation. Not something I understand, but it certainly happens frequently. (We see it in blogging all the time.)
Actually, I’m a believer in taking your kids out – a lot – and from an early age. Sure, some are more boisterous than others so only the parents can judge. But I took mine to all kinds of places, including good restaurants and art galleries. They learned to behave appropriately, because of frequency, insistence that they do so (even when they were little, my “escapes” had to include them). I also know I was lucky. Both boys were full of energy, but of temperaments to sit still for extended periods of time.
I think so much depends on the kids and the circumstances. Yet one more reason the parents know best.
Yes, yes, yes.
I think it’s important to take the kids out so that they can learn early how to navigate different settings and situations. I think your daughter and her friends were doing just fine – and you were, too, in walking away. I’m sure I would have done no good in apologizing, then suggesting that she raise her concerns better.
This part is hard – that fun can so quickly turn to self-consciousness or anger. Shame on her!
People just blow my mind. I think the general rule of thumb should be that we keep our opinions to ourselves unless it’s a matter of safety. And I’m talking real danger here. Otherwise, we operate under the Keep It To Yourself system!
From the sound of it, your daughter and her friends were being kids, in a kid-friendly environment. That poor woman sounds like an angry, sad person to me. I kind of feel for her. I was trying to think of something snappy you could have said, but I really believe you did the right thing by walking away. Why engage someone like that? She didn’t earn a conversation!
I’m not condoning the woman. That was a really bad way to handle it. If every child was running back and forth, then she should have chosen another restaurant. However, if it was only a few children doing this, then from her perspective, it was distracting. Usually, I expect children running from table to table in places like Chuck E Cheese or Peter Piper Pizza or other places, but like I said, I’m not condoning that woman’s behavior at all. She probaly should have chosen to eat elsewhere.
My husband and I do not have children. It doesn’t mean we hate children. We love OTHER people’s children. LOL. There have been incidences of bad behavior from families who condone the behavior and look at people like us (if we say anything, and we would never say anything) as if we hate children when all we want to do is to eat and enjoy conversation in a restaurant where people are sitting down and eating where there are no playground equipment or video games.
And before you hate me for saying the above…
We really only had two incidences of bad child behavior where the parent thought it was cute.
1) We were eating in Sedona on the patio. This child kept coming over to our table and laying his chin on it. He kept staring. We kept staring at the parents. The child kept bothering us and the parents kept ignoring the child. Finally, we simply took our food and drink and moved to a different table. The parents noticed their child annoying us, but they seemed offended when we moved our seats. We did it quietly so as not to create a scene.
2) We sat in a booth. We were having lunch. A family sat in the booth nearby. Their child leaned over and began to bother us. The parents were engrossed in their conversations. We couldn’t move and had a terrible lunch because we didn’t want to offend the parents and we didn’t know how to tell them that their child was being rude.
Like I said, I love children. I have candy and animal balloons stashed in my drawer at work for children. I love talking to children, but when we are out to eat my husband and I enjoy talking to each other.
You did the right thing by saying nothing. Nothing you could have said would have made the situation better. I’m glad it didn’t ruin your day. Going by your description, it sounds like alot of children were running around the restaurant. So maybe they should have chosen to eat someplace else?
there are a lot of things that bother me about the way this woman behaved. What bothers me most is that she was so rude to you and critical of you as a parent in front of “your” children.
You on the other hand behaved extremely well.
I think you are raising your daughter well and how dare that woman for jdging and saying otherwise! Maybe her mama didn’t raise her very well! I mean, I think it was not her place to speak to you like that. There are children at family friendly restaurants and yes, children sometimes walk around and get excited, but it was not like they were bothering this woman’s space. I think she was out of line.
Hmm…Calling you over to admonish you? That needles me. Either keep to yourself or go over and have a quiet word with the parents if you feel you absolutely must.
On the general question of whether children should be allowed to run around in restaurants? Well to my mind – no. Never. My reasoning is that if one table does it, why not everyone do it? Pretty soon chaos ensues in an environment that is not intended as a playground. Restaurants are designed often with polished/tiled floors, sharp table edges and are filled with hot food, cutlery, glasses and busy waiting staff, often walking half-blind with heavy trays, at eye level, laden with molten hot food. In other words: a recipe for disaster.
We took our girls out to dine literally from when they were babies (as I had been as a child) and because family restaurants are a very recent innovation here in the UK, we’d either take a book or allowed them some small toy or colouring book to sit quietly at the table with. We had a great time. They had a great time and we often had people come over and say how beautifully behaved our children were. (Before anyone screams at me about stunting their emotional growth – both have grown into happy, well-adjusted adults).
Coincidentally, I was ‘that woman’ who comments just last week. We were out at lunch and were sitting by two people out with their grandchildren. I was so struck at how impeccably behaved the boys were that I stopped on the way out to complement the family. It was simply a joy to see.
Having said all of the above, from reading your blog I can *tell* that you are raising your daughter well and you specifically say that you were at the *back* of what is presumably classed as a family-friendly restaurant on an exciting opening night. I don’t assume that the woman who summoned you is jealous, bitter and twisted, or even that she had been having a particularly bad day. I do, however, think that she had made assumptions, handled her irritation badly and that she was was out-and-out rude. You, on the other hand, handled yourself with absolute grace. When in doubt – walk away.
When we had just moved here, we were living in a hotel in dt Scottsdale and it was just myself and 3 of my children awaiting my husband’s arrival from WA state with his Volvo station wagon, which subsequently broke down in the mojave desert… for good! Anyway, my children and I were out to dinner at Applebee’s on Shea/101 when an older woman made the comment to me that I shouldn’t take my children out to a restaurant, as when she goes out to eat she wants to enjoy her meal?! We had just driven over 1650 miles in a couple of days with a dog and a cat in tow and were living in a hotel and this was the first time we had sat down for a meal that wasn’t at a drive-thru window! Thank goodness I had my older son with me as the woman was relentless and didn’t let it end, she kept going on and on and it got louder and louder and he defended our family. I was busy getting the little ones together to leave as we were finished anyway. The lady had made such an annoyance of herself and it had gotten so loud that the manager came over and told us that she was very sorry and told us that we could leave without paying our bill. I really don’t know what goes through people’s minds, Rudri? If they’ve had a bad day or not… kids are kids and this time lasts for such a short time. I smile at other people’s children when I’m out because I know just how fast it goes… this time will be gone before you know it!!
There is no shortage of uptight and “self-righteous” women (and men!) in the world so it doesn’t surprise me that this woman felt her language was permissible.
I can understand diners wanting peace when they’re eating out but I think people who feel free to talk like this have bigger issues to address within themselves.
We’ve been taking our son out to all sorts of establishments since he was a few months old, and where we live is generally kid-friendly so I’d say we’re lucky. There have been times when we’ve gotten glares from others if my son happens to speak a little too loudly. I’ve either simply ignored the stares, apologized or asked, “Hi, is there a problem?”
I think I would’ve been so charmed had I seen your “daughters” so full of joy. And how on earth are were they able to keep their shirts so pristine in the picture?
First things first: that photo is adorable! Brought a smile to my face!
I think you did the very wise thing, Rudri, by walking away. You avoided saying anything mean, and served as a strong role model to the girls. Sometimes it’s better to just walk away than start a fight. You obviously weren’t going to change this woman’s opinion, and she didn’t deserve a response.
It’s appalling what people think is acceptable to say to strangers or near-strangers. Where has our society lost our manners??
Clearly, she did not have kids. Or if she did, she stifled them so much that they’re now pinging back and forth trying to settle themselves and figure out how life is really meant to be lived. Hooray for friendships and shared chocolate shakes! That’s the good stuff.
I would have just walked away too because I would have been too mad to say anything!!
Wow- that’s a quite presumptuous statement to make to a stranger…You handled it well though. Nothing good can ever come from a debating a stranger, especially on child rearing.
I once had a man in a restaurant tell me my kids “almost ruined” his meal. I apologized, because I was sorry that was his experience.
His words stung me for awhile but I had to let it go because I have no idea why a pair of happy (though decidedly loud) children would ruin a meal. Hopefully I’m never that crotchety.
People should pick their battles wisely.
This one was foolish.
What do people hope to accomplish in a 3 second admonishment?
Change parenting styles to their own?
Come on.
I hope I never become like this.
Wow! I can’t believe she said that. Like you pointed out, if this had been a fine-dining establishment that really did not cater to kids, that would be one thing. But for it to obviously be a family-friendly restaurant, she really had no right to say that to you. If you do not want to be around noise and kids and things of that nature, then don’t go to one of these types of places. And it sounds like the girls weren’t even being “disruptive”, but were merely walking back and forth, laughing, and having a good time! You did the right thing by just ignoring this “lady”. It wasn’t worth your time or energy to engage her in battle.
I had a woman criticize my choice to spank Emma while out shopping. She said, “Perhaps she is just tired. Maybe the both of you could take a break.” Thankfully Matt was standing next to me and responded to her before I could. His words were sharp but polite. Mine would not have been.