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Yesterday, Iran’s president spoke at the United Nations. As he began, the entire UK delegation walked out. No, they didn’t need a potty break. It was an act of protest against an oppressive regime. And no one present missed the message.

Today, I spoke at a luncheon. Mid-way through my presentation, two ladies walked out. As it happened, this was not a protest. Instead, it was… a doctor’s appointment.

In the real world of public speaking, these things happen. Cell phones ring. (And occasionally – someone in the audience actually answers the call.) Talkative types continue their conversations, oblivious both to the speaker and to those around them. Waiters and busboys in the kitchen assume incorrectly that – with the kitchen door closed – we can’t hear them. Teens and 20-somethings text non-stop, like demented court stenographers (except that I’m pretty sure they aren’t writing down anything I say.

And sometimes, a person who would never dream of being rude simply feels an urgent call of nature. They exit because – when ya’ gotta go, ya’ gotta go.

All of these interruptions are distracting for the person speaking. But few such situations are improved by the speaker calling attention to them. For this reason, as long as people leave the room (or text) quietly, I try to hold the focus of the rest of the audience, because I understand that these are only momentary distractions.

However, in the case of ongoing noisy rudeness, I’ve learned (the hard way) that it is much better to let an audience of their peers correct the bad actors, than for me to do it directly.

If I take someone to task from the podium, I am assuming the role of parent or teacher of an unruly child – and that’s not my function. But – when I simply stop speaking, glance at the offending persons, then open my hands at mid-chest in a gesture of “what?” – the audience almost inevitably does the heavy lifting for me. Choruses of SHHHH! fill the room. Once in a while, a stern Good Samaritan will even walk over to the blabbermouths, and they fill the disapproving parent/teacher role. Better them than me.

There may be no known cure for the rudeness disease, but there is one pretty effective treatment. It occurs every time I am introduced on stage by someone well-known to and well-liked by the audience – someone who brings the instincts of a Marine Drill Sergeant to the podium. When that beloved peer lays down the law in advance, telling the crowd that they will turn off their cell phones, and they will listen attentively in a way that brings honor to their group, it has a most beneficial result. Generally, folks who know they are being held to a higher standard of behavior rise to the occasion.

At least – until they gotta go.

For many brides and grooms, pruning the guest list is the first real test of their marriage.

Guest lists have a tendency to grow and grow, until the harsh realities of limited seating space and costs per guest require (for most of us) some judicious “editing.”

What makes this process especially painful is the moment when bride and groom must choose between someone they both truly love and want to have present, and someone who – by blood or other relationship – they feel obligated to invite.

At such times, the question is often asked: “Do we really have to invite them?

And the one word answer is “no.” If you are the bride, you control the guest list.

That’s the good news. The bad news is, you are are also responsible for the consequences and repercussions of your decision.

One solution some of my couples choose is the Destination Wedding, where only the bride, groom, best man, maid of honor, and immediate families go to what will become the honeymoon location for a small ceremony. Other ready-made excuses for an “immediate family only” ceremony are choosing a small “boutique” hotel for the venue, or even having their event in the home of a close friend or relative.

A series of receptions, one for friends from work and school, another for family members, can follow. These are usually much more low-key and informal than a typical wedding reception, and give everyone the opportunity to feel included.

But there is one other reason you may not wish to invite a particular person, and it has nothing to do with limiting the size of your guest list. It may be a person whose behavior at such events has all too often been a source of embarrassment, or who has in some egregious way offended you.

Again – you don’t have to invite them. Indeed, I just worked with a bride who declined to invite her own father (for reasons he understood perfectly well.) But if not inviting them only creates a larger set of new problems, one solution may be to first have a blunt discussion with the person in question, detailing your expectations and eliciting a promise of good behavior. Then – at the event itself – you may be able to prevail upon a close friend or family member to “bird-dog” the problem child, monitoring their actions and inter-actions through the evening. (I have also known brides who had good luck by assigning their potentially troublesome guest to a limited official role – like working the bride’s table, or making sure of the head count on the out-of-town guests’ bus. Trusting them, even in a small way, paid dividends.)

In the real world, all of your guests have “problem” friends and relatives, too. If someone misbehaves at your event, no one is going to blame you. They will assign guilt where it belongs – on the offender. (And they will empathize with the no-win position inviting them put you in.)

But, at your wedding, nobody has the right to ruin your night. If there is someone whose mere presence will do just that, you may feel free – to paraphrase that master of the malapropism, Sam Goldwyn – to “include them out.”

Like most major cities, my town has some great downtown hotels and venues which are popular for wedding receptions. Unfortunately, they are a 30 to 45 minute drive from many of the suburban places of worship brides choose for their ceremonies.

In real terms, what this means is that guests from all over our metropolitan area must first trek out to the ‘burbs for the nuptials, then retrace their steps all the way back to the city center to be part of the reception. (And then afterwards, make yet another jaunt back home.)

Out-of-towners must bus from their host hotel to both sites, and then back again.

And time after time, I have seen that – the greater the distance between locations – the more chances there are for folks to get lost, delayed in traffic, or otherwise have their nerves frazzled.

For me, the solution is to keep the 3 key locations (ceremony site, reception site, and host hotel) as near to each other as possible.

If the ceremony site is crucial (a home church or college chapel, for instance), then I would suggest finding both a reception venue and host hotel nearby. And nothing is handier for your out-of-town guests than making their hotel and the reception site one and the same.

Conversely, if the reception site is most important, consider having the ceremony there as well.

Especially when one of your chosen sites is a considerable distance from where the majority of your guests will start and finish their day, I recommend moving them again as little as possible. (Take into account that – at most weddings – the guest list includes infants to elderly, as well some with mobility issues.)

How little? I can think of no circumstances where the driving time from hotel to ceremony, or ceremony to reception, should ever be more than 15 minutes. Even less is better.

If this requires compromising the bride’s vision of her special day, just remember: the only “perfect” wedding is one enjoyed by all the guests. Keeping their required relocations simple and quick makes them happy, giving you one less needless complication. And on your wedding day – that’s a really good thing.

I had the honor this past weekend of emceeing an event honoring a couple whose durable marriage and history of service to family and community earned them a long-overdue tribute dinner.

Like most such events, this one was set to consist of a time for guests to enter and visit with the couple, followed by the meal, a brief program from me, and then an opportunity for family and friends to offer their comments and toasts.

Prior to the event, the honorees entrusted me with the responsibility of pacing the evening. And – when I say “entrusted” – I mean that they handed the reins of their special night to me. Such assurance is rare in my business – I almost always have a chairperson or party planner who outranks me. Their faith was very liberating. It gave me the flexibility to run the show, based on my years of experience. If I thought it was time to move on to the next item on the agenda, no one was going to second guess me. I have to admit, it felt really good.

For about five minutes.

Then the realization soaked into my thick cranium that – if this party bombed – there would be little doubt who was to blame. It would be yours truly, and nobody else.

Fortunately for me, things went pretty well. At least, the guests of honor seemed pleased.

But it made me realize – for the very first time – how Newton’s Third Law of Motion (“For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.”) affects our daily lives.

How many college freshman are so thrilled to be “free” of parental constraints, that they flunk out their first semester? They overdose on the freedom, without accepting its equal and opposite: responsibility to show up for class and study.

(In the interest of full disclosure, I should point out that – while I didn’t technically “flunk out” my first semester – I didn’t wow anyone with my mature behavior, either.)

However, the older I get, the more I agree with Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore:
I slept and dreamt that life was joy / I awoke and found that life was service
I acted and behold, service was Joy.

The lyrics which form the title of today’s entry are from Rick Nelson’s 1972 hit “Garden Party,” composed after he was booed at a Madison Square Garden “Oldies” show for daring to include some newer tunes. As a philosopher, Rick may not rank beside Confucius or Lao Tse, but I do believe he expressed an important truth in this simple chorus.

All parties (not just the garden variety) need to express a point of view – be it that of the host and hostess or the guest of honor. The choice of music (as well as its volume) at a silver or golden anniversary event should – generally – reflect the tastes of the honorees. Food, timing, and decor at a quincinera and bar or bat mitzvah need to be appropriate for early teens. Everything at a wedding ceremony and reception ought to be an extension of the bride’s personality. (Sorry about that, grooms. The rehearsal dinner is your event.)

As the song truly says, “You can’t please everyone…” Or, at least, you can’t expect to please them all at the same time.

For this reason, many multi-generational gatherings offer sequential olive branches to their various constituencies. The music selection and volume at a wedding reception is often geared to older guests early in the evening, moving forward chronologically (and moving upward in decibels) as the event progresses.

But – too often – planners who try to please everyone wind up pleasing no one. The younger folks are bored out of their minds, long before any of “their” music is heard. And everyone over 40 hurriedly says their “good nights”, the moment the first Hip Hop song is played. By trying to have a “one size fits all” event, your perfect party feels like a perfect disaster. At least when you please yourself, somebody is happy, all the time.

Please understand that I’m not advocating knowingly alienating part of your crowd. I’m simply saying that it is almost impossible to keep everybody equally happy, all night long – with one major exception.

And that is, unless they’re happy because you are happy. If it’s your party, and you are having the time of your life, most of your guests will share in your joy (if not in your musical tastes.)

And frankly, when you are the guest of honor, or when your money is paying for the event, you have every right “to please yourself.” (So thanks for the wise words, Rick. Ozzie and Harriet would be proud!)

Over this past Labor Day weekend, I played for a post-wedding brunch held the morning after the big event. Guests had been told that dress for the affair was casual. But never have I seen “casual” cover so much territory.

Part of this was due to the fact that many of the invitees were from out of town, and had only brought a limited selection of clothes from which to choose. But a lot of the least dressed-up were young locals, which leads me to conclude that the word “casual” itself has now become a subject of considerable generational confusion.

Older guests tend to define the word as meaning blazer but no tie for the guys and informal dresses or slacks for the ladies. But a growing number of younger guests apparently regard it as a license to wear the shirt they slept in, and it is this trend which has prompted some pre-party pre-emptive action by those hosting the events.

At similar gathering recently, the hostess actually called me personally to clarify the parameters of appropriate wear. To her, “casual” meant Tommy Bahama-style shirts and khakis. Apparently, every other guy got the same phone call, because we all showed up dressed for a Carnival Cruise.

Other hosts narrow the variety by designating their dress code as “Business Casual,” “Dressy Casual,” or even “Party Casual.” These terms seem to communicate well to both men and women. And so it is only the generic term itself that has become seriously degraded.

Knowing this, we may soon see the day when an invitation arrives, asking us to wear Clean Casual, or Ironed Casual. Because just as styles change, so do word usages. And it appears that “casual” is a word which now carries a completely different meaning to one generation than another.

The war is over, and the old definition lost. So hostesses, you’ve now got 3 options: Plan to call each guest individually to discuss wardrobe, use modifying terms (like maybe “Country Club Casual?”) in your invitations that make explicit your dress code, or… learn to be okay with greeting a guest at the door who has come “Ultra” Casual.

In 1992, independent candidate Ross Perot took on the sitting President of the United States (Republican George H.W. Bush) and the Democrat nominee (Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton) in a 3-way contest for the White House. Conventional wisdom dictates that he should have had no chance at all. Why?

1. He had never sought or held public office before, and thus had no track record.
2. As an independent, he had no party backing or organization.
3. In our telegenic age of blow-dried candidates with $300 coifs, his white-sidewalled crew cut had hardly changed since his years at the U.S. Naval Academy. While Bush resembled the Chairman of the Board at the local polo club, and Clinton both looked and spoke like a televangelist, Perot came across as Everyman. If ever there could be a “People’s Billionaire,” it was him.

Which is why 20 million Americans – 19% of the voters – cast their ballots for the gentleman from Texarkana. Apparently, they considered his message more important than his lack of elected experience or his supposed sartorial shortcomings. Uncounted millions more wanted to vote for him, and would have, had they not bought into the canard – no doubt endorsed by the Democrat and Republican National Committees – that he could “never” win. (Note to all would-be Nostradami: prognosticators who say never – ie. “we can never split the atom, …put a man on the moon, …elect a non-white President, etc. – tend to have a diet rich in crow.)

What exactly was this message that compelled 20 million Americans to “throw away” their votes? It was the very Essence of America – that’s what.

Perot said that if every grandparent understood how relinquishing their personal claims to a Social Security check would save their grandchildren from inheriting a bankrupt America – they would gladly do so. This was the “Greatest Generation,” after all – folks for whom no sacrifice was too much in order leave their beloved country better able to face the future.

So, with pie charts and straight talk, Perot gave us all fair warning of the financial melt-down to come. Events of the past months how only proved how right he was.

Last November, I was convinced that the Greatest Generation had given way to the Narcissist Generation, a group of voters who believed in “Me First,” and cared not a whit for the debt they were leaving for their children to shoulder. I would have told you then that – had Ross Perot been running in 2008 – he’d have gotten less than 2% of the vote.

But now, at the end of what has truly been the Long Hot Summer of town hall meetings, I think the tide may have turned. A late-August Rasmussen poll found that 57% of Americans would vote to kick out all 535 of our senators and congressmen. A 21st century Ross Perot (or Bill Cosby, or Rick Warren) run might trigger the biggest electoral upset in our nation’s history.

Like a lot of super-successful businessmen, Perot really was able to see into the future (which is how they become so successful in the first place.) And he got 20 million voters to share his vision. Unfortunately, it’s taken 17 years for most Americans to catch up. Now the problems have reached critical mass.

So Ross – if you’re interested – America needs someone with your clarity. America needs to hear your message again now. Only this time, it’s we who will be “all ears.”

In the classic Western, The Magnificent 7, Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen – as Chris and Vin – approach gunfighter Bernardo Reilly about joining their team. Reilly, played by Charles Bronson, is chopping wood for his supper. But he speaks with pride about the $600 he was paid for one job and the $800 he received for another. He’s obviously a man who – in the past – was paid a lot of money. Chris tells him, “The job pays $20.” Bernardo first scoffs at the low pay, but then he puts down his ax and says, “Right now – $20 is a lot of money.”

These days, party professionals in general and music providers in particular can identify with Bronson’s comment. They too are accomplished veterans, highly regarded within their industry, and have earned big bucks for their efforts in the past.

But that was then. Today is another story.

Right now, if you are willing to work with them regarding the date of your event, you should be pleasingly surprised how far your entertainment dollar will go. Saturday nights in the very near future, or less than prime times months from now, are selling at discounted rates for the simple reason that event specialists would rather work for less than to not work at all.

One caveat: don’t expect much of a deal on the first and second weekends in December, or on New Year’s Eve. But that open Saturday three weeks from now could be yours for a steal.

Hard times impact the party business more than the neighborhood grocery store or gas station. You’ve got to eat, and your car has to have gas, but you can scale down a party (or even cancel it altogether.) So event professionals are among the first to feel the effects of any economic downturn.

Go ahead, then. Ask a music provider or caterer what they can do for you in your budget range. Chances are very good that they will be thrilled to work with you. Because Charles Bronson was correct: “Right now – $20 is a lot of money.”

Earlier today, my music-loving pastor asked me – as a guy who plays tunes for a living, as opposed to for my own enjoyment – which songs I’d be happy to never play again. After reflecting on that question for a few hours, I’ve decided that my “List of the Least” would have to fall into 3 categories:

1. Ubiquitous melodies. Joy To The World (“Jeremiah was a bullfrog…”), Tie A Yellow Ribbon, and Feelings (“Woah-oh-oh…”) were so overplayed for so long that – whatever their merits – I just got sick to death of playing them. Even truly beautiful songs like Unchained Melody (the Righteous Brothers hit featured in Ghost) can and have been worn out, simply from excessive use.

2. Over-dramatic tunes. Lushly produced, hyper-emotional songs (pretty much anything by Whitney Houston, Michael Bolton, Celine Dion, and Barry Manilow) get really old, really fast. And so did New York, New York (about 30 years ago, and ever since.) The fact is, all these hits are much more showcases for the vocal chops and technique of their singers than they are great songs. I think it’s instructive that the 2 best known purveyors of New York, New York (Liza Minnelli and Frank Sinatra) are both Academy Award-winning actors. Given one of these talents, a 36-piece orchestra, and enough reverb, even Itsy Bitsy Spider could be a show-stopper.

3. Just plain lame songs. “In the desert, you can’t remember your name, ’cause there ain’t no one for to give you no pain.” (Aah – where should I even begin with this one?) This excerpt from the ’70s hit Horse With No Name tortures its syntax, uses double negatives, and displays a total logic lobotomy – all to set up a rhyme that doesn’t rhyme!

But my vote for the Worst Lyrics Ever is this verse from another ’70s classic, Put Your Hand In The Hand Of The Man. “Every time I look into the Holy Book, I wanna tremble / When I read about the part where the Carpenter cleared the temple / ‘Cause the buyers and the sellers were no different fellers than what I profess to be / And it causes me pain to know I’m not the man that I should be.”

This song was a huge hit. And we who made its composers rich deserved more than them (not) rhyming “tremble” with “temple.” Secondly, last I heard, Joseph was the carpenter, Jesus was a rabbi (teacher.) Next, the buyers and the sellers were only “no different fellers” if you like the idea of attending worship services where the Eucharist is brought to you by Pepsi-Cola. And finally, the composers set up the verse to end with a rhyme for the word “be.” They had an alphabet full of options to work with, including “me,” “see,” and every adverb ending in -ly. So which of the dozens of possibilities did they choose to rhyme with “be?” Why – be, of course! (At least it actually did rhyme, though I suspect Cole Porter rolled over in his grave a few times.)

But now that I’ve given you my non-hit parade, I would ask you to please remember that – if you hire me – you can feel free to request any of these songs you wish. (And Ring My Bell. And Torn Between Two Lovers, To All The Girls I’ve Loved Before, and… )

I “got away from it all” this past weekend at one of the growing number of religious retreats organized and led by the lay members of congregations. For Protestants, “The Walk To Emmaus” is a popular program of this type, while Catholics may attend similar sessions called ACTS (for Adoration, Community, Theology, and Service). What these and other such spiritual getaways have in common are a peer-run opportunity for reflection and renewal. (Lev Shalom, which is Hebrew for “heart peace,” has a related goal, but is led by rabbis).

Over a period of 60+ hours, veterans of previous weekends who were otherwise ordinary husbands and fathers like me (the ladies go to separate gatherings) shared their insights and testimonies with us new guys – who are known as “retreatants” or “pilgrims,” depending on the program. All of the stories touched me, but none more than the farmer who told of the joy he found as a small boy, riding on the tractor with his dad. Ultimately the day came when his father made the first few circuits of a field, then moved to one side and invited his son to sit behind the wheel. The son asked “What should I do?” And the patient father pointed at the rows already sown and replied, “Just follow my path.”

Those four words had an immediate and tangible impact on the crowd, dads and Believers (or at least Seekers), all. Ironically, in the discussion that followed, I got the impression that our presenter may not have realized their profundity. To him, he was just quoting what his own dad had said.

But the truth is, our children, students, and those who work for us do follow our paths, learning by our example. The challenge for us is to be sure that the lessons we teach are good, and are the ones we intended. And for that, we have examples of our own to guide us. The Torah, Bible, Koran, and Tao each offer lessons in following our Father’s path. (in fact – one common translation of “Tao” is: “path.”)

Weekend retreats “out of town” aren’t required for re-dedication. But – sometimes – the best way to find the right path is to get off the beaten one. I am so glad that I did.