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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think this is a bit mean?

43 replies

SallySeasick · 20/01/2016 15:38

Petty but it's stuck in my mind.

My mum is retired but very lively and chatty. She loves talking to people out and about and just making conversation. People do seem to warm to her too, mainly.

Anyway went on family hol recently and she started chatting to older lady and her daughter, who was maybe in her thirties. Mum was being really chatty but passport queues and luggage probs were making everyone a bit grumpy so we were trying to get her to hurry up. The woman's daughter looked a bit tired and exasperated too.

We then bumped into them again at the airport on the way home. Mum said a cheery hello and daughter kind of visibly rolled her eyes and gave us a sarcastic smile!!

Aibu to think that's pretty bloody rude? My mums not stupid, she takes social cues and was hardly going to accost them?!

OP posts:

BillBrysonsBeard · 20/01/2016 16:36

Very rude to visibly eye roll like that, not rude to think it though! I've been in long airport queues and the last thing most people want is someone nattering at them. The odd comment yes but not a long chat. But the woman shouldn't have been visibly rude!

Sunbeam1112 · 20/01/2016 16:50

Sometimes people don't want to talk she obviously saw your mum and ecpected another lenghty convo. My auntie does this as she lives on her own and can speak without thinking.

TheHiphopopotamus · 20/01/2016 16:50

Yes, the woman was rude.

But I can't think of anything worse than having to make small talk with a 'chatty' random person.

DaisyDando · 20/01/2016 16:56

How can anyone see this from the other daughter's point of view? It is never, ever ok to eye roll or giggle nastily at a retired woman being friendly. I'd be hurt and angry for my mum if it was me.

Chewbecca · 20/01/2016 16:57

I think you are quits.

Your mum clearly overstepped the mark on the way out and missed the cues to stop nattering, that was UR

They were rude eye rolling on the return, that was UR

Your view is that their rudeness was worse than your DM's but that's a very personal view and many wouldn't agree.

KurriKurri · 20/01/2016 17:00

I think it was a mean - it doesn't hurt to be kind to people even if you might find them a little irritating. It's not like you are ever going to see them again or they want to be your best friend - they are just chatting. Some people chat because they are lonely and don't get to talk to others on a daily basis - is it really so hard to be friendly and pleasant to others?

I would happily shoot the breeze with your Mum in a queue OP if I met her and think 'what a nice lady' afterwards.

And as an aside I can think of hundreds of things worse than having to make small talk with 'chatty' random people.

Queenbean · 20/01/2016 17:02

How did the woman know that your mum was only going to say hi the second time and that she wouldn't be stuck in conversation for ages again?

I am happy to talk to strangers but not when I'm in a situation of being forced to do so (ie, in an airport queue). I would have thought the same as this lady "please don't talk to me again!!"

LiviaDrusillaAugusta · 20/01/2016 17:04

Actually if the person who is accosting them won't take the hint, she may have just been annoyed so not surprising she showed it. Maybe she thought it was the only way to discourage any further chat.

The 'nasty giggling' may not even have been about that.

Someone saying more than hello to me would possibly spark off a slightly panicky reaction - I would be looking around for a way to avoid a conversation.

It's obvious from your first post that you were having a job trying to get your mum to leave the people - I think in that situation, people could react less politely than the daughter did.

And that's without even considering that they could have been going to a funeral, be nervous about travelling, be in a hurry etc.

As a PP said, let it go, just be aware that not everyone wants to chat to strangers and some may be rude about it if they feel they have no other way.

LiviaDrusillaAugusta · 20/01/2016 17:06

I should clarify I have MH issues, hence the panic, but I'm not alone in that. And actually they didn't know whether OP's DM was going to be a bit difficult to get away from - I have had this happen to me.

Sweetdreamsforall · 20/01/2016 17:13

sally it was rude, and to do it so visibly to your faces just reflects the kind of person your mum was talking to.

If it bothered me I would politely excuse myself if I could, or turn away to begin a quiet conversation with my present company. I would have just waved hello politely again on the way back, then looked forward and carried on. I could never be so rude to an innocent friendly woman who was just chatting and being nice. I was raised better than that. They should be ashamed.

Kindness and manners cost nothing. But some people are mean and rude in life without cause, that's just how it is. Just forget it, they aren't worth your time op

As an aside I am a huge fan of the eyeroll, given the right context. One must not overuse the eyeroll but rather save it for an occasion of purpose. For example when my fil's evil wife begins another one of her condescending diatribes on parenting I swiftly look to my dh behind her back and give him the signal eyeroll and we disembark the bitchery ship to go make fresh brews.

LiviaDrusillaAugusta · 20/01/2016 17:29

So some poor mare wants to escape another potentially long convo with a stranger and is called rude? In that situation she may not have been sure that your mum would have picked up the cues if she had just turned away so she was being very obviously rude so that she could avoid that.

MustangMillie · 20/01/2016 17:31

Are you the daughter Livia?

mommy2ash · 20/01/2016 17:40

I wouldn't mind if I came across as rude if I was trying to dodge a convo with a stranger at an airport. I find traveling stressful and wouldn't want to make small talk. It's nice sometimes when you strike up a conversation with a stranger to pass a bit of time but sometimes the other party might not want a conversation and that's ok too

SilverBirchWithout · 20/01/2016 17:42

I have a slightly different take on this.

Do you think the eye roll and sarcastic smile was the way the daughter was trying to interact with you? As a way of connecting with you, sort of a "friendly" signal saying how irritating travelling with both our mothers can be. This may have been triggered by her awareness that you were trying to hurry up your mother when you last met.

LiviaDrusillaAugusta · 20/01/2016 18:00

No not the daughter - just someone who has been talked at by strangers too many times

Jux · 20/01/2016 18:01

That girl, the dd, had spent all her 30-odd years kow-towing to her monster of a mum. However, while changing her mum's library books, she had managed to exchange a few words with a young handsome librarian. Over the course of about 18m, they had stolen moments when the mother was looking the other way, or distracted by the librarian's colleagues, during which they had fallen in love. The mother felt something was changing in her daughter, and determined to root it out. She arranged a holiday, during which she would ensure her daughter was brought to book and reminded of her duty put back in her box. The daughter and librarian (with his colleagues' help) hatched a plan to free her forever. She would pack as if she were going with her mum, but at the queue for check-in she would say she didn't really want to go whereupon her mother would turn on her and berate her soundly thus showing publicly what a monster she was, then the daughter would make a general appeal to help her escape the torture she had had to endure and run.

Sadly, she missed her moment because a very kind and lovely mum, sensing this girl was in need of help, tried to strike up a conversation with her. Little did she know, that if she had abandoned her plan and allowed the mum to befriend her, she would have had a much nicer holiday, and at the end of it would have had the might of the whole of MN behind her. Instead of living on the breadline with a poor, but handsome, librarian, she would have married a duke and her mum would have become her chambermaid.

The kind mother would have been Damed and run many committees holding MPs to account.

MustangMillie · 20/01/2016 18:09

Jux

Battleshiphips2 · 20/01/2016 18:12

I love my mil dearly and get on fab with her but she can be quite overbearing with her behaviour towards strangers. She will talk the leg off a donkey to anyone. I have walked away sometimes because there are some people who obviously don't wish to chat but she just carries on. When she gets someone who enjoys her chatting it's lovely though. One person thanked her and said they'd been feeling really lonely and her stopping to talk to them made their day. The daughter was a bit rude but to be fair not everyone wants to chat or has the same outgoing personality as your mum. You're best just to try and forget about it.

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