Table Manners

So, the woman who brought me up, Cookie Parnell, is a true Southern Belle. Cookie grew up in Wilmington and Wrightsville Beach, NC; lovely little coastal towns that have become a popular family and young people tourist destination and is growing in its reputation for being a liberal haven in southeastern North Carolina. Cookie is smart, beautiful, bright, proper, and practically runs the volunteer scene in Charlotte. The more I think about it, Cookie represents the "Proper Southern Belle"--both the good and the bad. I like to think I take after her in many ways (extraodinary hostess, witty and charming, throw excellent parties, great cooks, have style and always look their best. Ok, maybe not that.) and I have dramtically fallen off the perverbial Southern Belle wagon (mostly with regards to inappropriate bodily functions, the fact that I eat a lot, I regularly make out with people on a first date, I curse like a sailor, and I am not afraid to go after someone I want. Unless I am really into them. That's another story.). All in all, I've taken a little from the past (excellent party thrower, etc) and have blazed into the present (I sneer at women who are afraid to ask someone out. I mean, honestly, what's the point?).

Clearly I still value things the ole' Cook-ster taught me at a wee age, among them being table manners. I never thought that it was strange or weird or different than anyone else to put my napkin in my lap, not talk with my mouth full, put my soup spoon on the side of the plate rather than leave it in the bowl, use proper utensils. Apparently, I am wrong. I never noticed other peoples' table manners until I escaped to college. Specifically, I have a friend who once told me the first thing he really noticed about me was my table manners (so, he said it when he was trying to hit on me. it worked.). It was those late night freshmen year chats that enlightened me that not everyones' parents made them go to teen cotillion classes, where they learned how to dance outdated dances (tango, waltz, foxtrot, etc. we learned how to shag--the dance--which is still useful every few years). Another friend of mine took an etiquette class her first year in college because her then-gf (a debutante) asked her to take it with her. My roommate remembers her mom reading to her and her sisters from Emily Post. In fact, there are literally hundreds of books and websites about how to raise one's children with good manners. There are women (and men, for that matter) whose lives were totally devoted to having "good" manners; people who learned a set of manners that would enable them to quickly climb the social ladder.

I used to think that manners were just part of my Southern upbringing--an upper-middle class mostly happy childhood. I learned how to behave in social settings (children should be seen and not heard), I learned how to be a gracious host, how to treat guests, how to act at the table. In short, Southern social graces. (There are, of course, those who would argue that I've lost those graces, being in yankee-land for so long. she is the one in the pink dress and blond wig.). Manners, however, don't denote one's class or race or gender or sexuality or religion. So if manners no long indicate one's class (with the idea that there is a segment of the population who would aspire to "behave" like the segment above it), why are people still so obsessed with teaching their young antiquated traditions?

Disclaimer: I'm sick, so this is totally incoherant.