The Kindness of RSVP-ing

"A tree is known by its fruit, a man by his deeds.  A good deed is never lost, he who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and he who plants kindness gathers love."
― Saint Basil

One of the Kindness Muses suggested that I write about RSVP-ing as kindness.  She hosted an event at her home yesterday and some people did not respond to the invitation.  It sounded like a great idea to me, but I felt a bit awkward because, in the interest of full disclosure, I do not have a perfect RSVP-ing record -- much as I would like to.  But I knew it was a terrific suggestion.

My friend the hostess spent time cleaning her house and preparing for the event.  "I can't believe that some folks have just ignored the invitation!!" she wrote yesterday morning.  "Not kind!"

For guidance, I reached out to another dear friend who has the most impeccable manners.  In fact, one would not expect more of him on the thoughtfulness and politeness fronts if he were a viscount and dedicated himself full-time to the pursuit of good living with ample time for the social graces.  But he is a busy professional and father, and yet he always RSVPs and writes beautiful thank you notes to boot.  He was travelling, but that did not deter him from responding to me right away.

"I think if someone was kind and thoughtful enough to invite you to an event, out of courtesy and respect, one should promptly RSVP," he said.  "It shows respect and appreciation to your host."

The subject of not RSVP-ing has been broadly covered, especially with respect to weddings.  In one article, the author included a photo of a humorous RSVP card that set forth various options for responding, including "resentfully attend" and "will decline to respond but ultimately attend."

What is it with some of us not RSVP-ing to events, even sometimes?  For me, at times it is trying to figure out if our family schedule will permit attending.  When my children were younger, I used to try to attend every birthday party to which they were invited, but over time that can be more than we really want to do.  I think some of us, and definitely I include myself here, don't want to over-commit and yet we feel guilty for not going and so we waffle and that waffling gets in the way of responding.  Poor excuses, for sure.  The bottom line is that there is no good excuse to not RSVP.  And now that I have written that, I will certainly try to follow in the footsteps of people like my hostess friend and the viscount, and make a much bigger effort to respond.  After all, it is most definitely the kind thing to do.