I'm Lizzie Post, and I am a co-president
at the Emily Post Institute in Burlington, Vermont,
where I am an author on all things etiquette.
My great, great grandmother, Emily Post
actually didn't start her career
in etiquette until she was in her 50s.
Emily's big bestselling book Etiquette,
came out in 1922, and it was really popular.
A lot of people found that Emily was able
to give them a peek into the world of high society.
We really changed over time to focus mostly
on practical, solid social standards for every American.
Almost a hundred years later, we are very proud as a family
to still be carrying on Emily's legacy.
On today's show, we take your questions
on donations you don't want to make.
We have a podcast, Awesome Etiquette,
where we answer every day, modern questions
and some traditional questions about etiquette.
Our question of the week
is about how to refuse a gift kindly.
So many things have changed since Emily's original book.
Even the use of sir and ma'am are things
that are much more debated today
than they ever were in Emily's day.
And it's important to recognize these changes.
When it comes to splitting the bill,
in Emily's day, in 1922,
she wrote, "People should order the meal ahead,
pay for it in advance, including the waiter's tip."
Now, she's not far off on this one from today.
We do advise that if you're inviting someone
and treating them,
and you really want no bill to show up whatsoever,
that you should pay for the bill ahead of time.
There's nothing wrong with doing that.
But today, more often than not,
we aren't inviting and treating so much
as just all meeting up at a restaurant together.
And the one thing we really need to watch out for today
is that not everybody has the same budget.
And it can be really frustrating
if you've only ordered a salad and had water
throughout a meal, to have folks who ordered
two or three courses and some sort of wine
or other beverages pipe up and say,
oh, let's just split it evenly among everybody.
It's really important to be aware of who's ordered what
at the table before just suggesting
that we split it all evenly.
When it comes to leaving an event or gathering early,
Emily wrote, in 1922,
"There is no actual precedence in being the first to go."
Today, and especially right now today,
socializing has been difficult for a lot of us
during this time.
But you should pull your host aside and say,
I'm terribly sorry,
either if you're not feeling well, obviously say that
but you can also say I'm more overwhelmed
than I thought I would be.
I think it'd be best for me to head home or, you know
all of a sudden I'm not feeling as comfortable
as I thought I would, so I'm gonna head home,
but I hope you all have a good,
really good rest of the night.
And thank you so much for inviting me.
And it's really important to both balance that self-care
with the politeness of making sure that you thank your host
and you let them know what's going on
rather than just disappearing out of the party.
Generally at Emily Post,
we defer to our three principles of treating people
with consideration, respect, and kindness.
But for me, I also really like to promote the idea
of being aware of the people around you
is one of the first steps you can take
to having excellent etiquette.
Being patient with the people around you
also goes a very, very long way
towards understanding that individualized
need and expectation around rudeness and politeness
and then being compassionate.
The more that we can recognize that even with differences,
we are all people that deserve respect
and deserve consideration,
the better off we're gonna be together.