I know this is a parents’ blog. I know, I am a mother. I know I adore my kids and mostly like spending time with them. And yet, I find myself silently smiling at the news of restaurants that are starting to ban children. It is not that I think children shouldn’t ever be allowed to eat out and I certainly don’t think all eating establishments should be kid-free, but I am not surprised nor offended that some places have instituted a no-kid policy.

There are certain nights, rare as they are, where my husband and I have the supreme pleasure of dining on our own like the civilized adults we used to be. We never go to eat at a place where we’d take our kids. We specifically look for restaurants that we deem “adult.”  On these nights, there is nothing worse than sitting down next to a table with kids. Now, lest you think I’m heartless,  if they’re well-behaved usually I can just smile at the cuteness and ignore them for the rest of my evening. But on those occasions where that isn’t possible, a kid can wreck a meal. The kid who throws his food? I’ve had enough of that during my own kitchen-highchair days, thanks. The kid who screams when she doesn’t get what she wants? She is too young for a nice dinner. How about the “cute” singing that is the loudest sound in the room? Please. Make. It. Stop.

Typically, most of these children aren’t really doing anything wrong. They are acting like kids. But they may have parents who are too beleaguered, tired or stressed to have properly planned and now they don’t even notice or maybe don’t care that kids acting like kids might not be appropriate for a dining room. In some extreme circumstances, kids are just permitted to act like brats and no one does anything about it. That may seem harsh. But I know you’ve seen them, running through a restaurant near you. I suspect these are just the instances, the kids running or banging forks on plates or the guy who tried to steal my fork once at a work lunch (yes, that happened!),  that got kids banned to begin with. [Read more...]