Covid letters

[conuly]

1. DEAR MISS MANNERS: Is it right that my niece insists on “no masks” at her wedding? She even has a friend watching for masks as people enter the church!!!

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2. DEAR HARRIETTE: I have several family members who are mad at me. A week before Thanksgiving, they asked if they could come to dinner at my house. At that point, the authorities were already saying that it was unsafe to do. So, I put the kibosh on it right then and there. One of my nieces told me that I was being selfish and that she was never going to visit me again. I held my ground. I am in my 60s with several health challenges, and I thought I should follow the guidelines. Then I saw that lots of people didn’t. Travel skyrocketed during Thanksgiving. I pray that we don’t have too many people getting sick behind it. Meanwhile, my niece is not talking to me. How can I get her back and still protect myself? -- Rift

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3. Dear Amy: My brother is turning 30 in two months.

His husband is planning an out-of-state surprise birthday weekend, seven hours away, where he and my brother and their friends will be staying in a large 14-person cabin.

My family (me, my pregnant wife and our daughter) have been given the option of a smaller separate cabin. So have our parents. Everyone has eagerly accepted, except for my family and my parents.

Our governor is imposing more pandemic restrictions. Anyone traveling out of state has to quarantine for two weeks when returning.

My wife and I cannot quarantine for two weeks and miss work.

We also all live within 10 minutes of each other, so the need for a 30th birthday weekend getaway seems unnecessary to us.

My wife and I have conveyed our hesitance, but my brother-in-law keeps telling us how much my brother deserves this extravaganza.

Amy, my brother-in-law has been known to stir the pot and create drama. He has already intimated how disappointed my brother will be.

My brother and I have a shaky relationship, as it is. He could write me and my family off completely over one false move. Writing off siblings runs in my family; both of my parents do not speak to any of their siblings, and my grandparents on both sides didn’t have relationships with their siblings.

I wanted this cycle of sibling discord to be broken in my generation, and not model this same behavior for my children.

Should I risk ruining the surprise by letting my brother know in advance that we can’t come?

— Worried Bro

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typing is rude, I guess

[jadelennox]

DEAR MISS MANNERS: As usual, I am receiving a few Christmas cards that are coming custom-printed with such sentiments as “Merry Christmas from The Johnson Family,” or “Happy Holidays from The Andersons,” instead of being hand-signed.

While I have always found these cards to be somewhat impersonal, I am willing to accept the notion that some people feel a custom-printed card is “classy,” and I am especially willing to excuse them if they’ve taken the time to hand-address the envelope.

The straw that breaks my back is when the cards come from people who use a computer to create address labels, which is, to me, the height of impersonal.

I am writing for your permission to feel slightly insulted when I receive a card from someone whose annual Christmas-card-sending ritual doesn’t even include picking up a pen.

GENTLE READER: Permission denied. But if you want to reverse this, Miss Manners will approve. She admires a prettily hand-addressed envelope as much as anyone, but there is nothing classy about withholding a personal touch, and the place for that is in the card itself.

At UExpress