DEAR MISS MANNERS: Over the years, my husband and I have collected a nice variety of books, which we keep in several large bookcases in our small living room.
I refer to some of them regularly, as they are reference books. Others are old classics, some are books from my childhood, and one shelf is full of handwritten personal journals spanning the past 30 years.
When guests visit, sometimes they browse the shelves and help themselves to our books to leaf through them. Is this appropriate behavior?
I would not presume to help myself uninvited to the books in someone else’s home, especially personal journals, except perhaps to look through coffee table books displayed or opened on a table.
GENTLE READER: The subject of what are reasonable boundaries for guests could fill several books, if not a whole house, but Miss Manners takes as a general precept that both host and guest are seeking to avoid embarrassment all around.
For the guest, this would mean limiting oneself to perusing one or two books at most. For the host, this would mean keeping something as private as a journal out of the living room.
(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)
