Are you a Cottage Princess or a Dock Depressor? You could be, and not even know it.
My husband and I have been invited for two coming weekends at different cottages, one with friends we consider to be family, another with family we consider to be friends.
And while I've been thinking about what a blast we're going to have, I've also been diligently reviewing the rules of good cottage guest behaviour. Because you easily can slip up and be the Bad Cottage Guest your hosts are still talking about on Labour Day weekend.
My mother-in-law, who has been entertaining for decades at her Laurentian log cabin, maintains you can get to know more about people's qualities - good and bad - by having them at your cottage for one weekend than you would in a year of seeing them socially in the city.
So with that in mind, here's my list of cottage undesirables.
First, the Cottage Princess. She not only doesn't lift a finger, but she whines about the lack of amenities. My worst experience when I was the host was of a woman who arrived with two young kids, plunked herself down and said, "Ahhh, now I'm really on vacation," leaving us to mind her children and provide the meals. She even suggested there should be a second bathroom! She was puzzled about the annual note I subsequently sent her when summer rolled around: "Oh, we don't have that cottage any more."
Then there's the Dock Depressor - the guy who brings down the mood at happy hour on the dock with a windy seminar on every apocalyptic current-affairs scenario you hoped to leave behind for a week or so. He may find himself being sent up the hill for ice to give everybody else a sunny interval between the gloom and doom.
And speaking of sunny intervals, how about the Weather Whiner? It's never hot enough, dry enough or even breezy enough for the weather grump, who complains as if the hosts are the Weather Mastahs and can immediately - poof - change that cloud pattern. Why doesn't he just run to the dock and retrieve all the towels before lightning strikes?
Which brings us to the Towel Eaters. Oops, they didn't bring their own towels. Oops, they use a minimum of three a day. Come on, guys, someone's got to wash them. Other eco-disasters include Water Hogs and Septic Skeptics - the former use too much water showering or doing the dishes, while the latter flagrantly disobey the cute hand-lettered sign that says "Don't put toilet paper in the toilet." Let's face it, these septic-tank violators are way too anal for the relaxed hygiene standards of cottage life and are much better off being exfoliated at a very good spa.
There's the Fidgeter - clearly unable to settle into a laidback cottage routine, she's all over the place, cellphone on vibrate in her pocket, her eyes shiny beads of "What's next?" She's exhausting. And who can forget the Food Folly Twins - those folks who astonishingly arrive empty-handed, claiming the supermarket or liquor store was closed, or on the flipside those foodies who are still in the kitchen making their special tapenade long after the rest of the crowd are so hungry they are chewing on their arms.
Although hosts could also be a bit better behaved in this regard. One of my hostesses seems to have anticipated food problems by putting in her e-mail invitation "I like to eat." Hmmm, does that mean I need to hire a U-Haul and fill it with various cuts of meat?
But let's be positive - how can you be a cottage superstar? The kind that gets an auto-invite for next year before the summer is over.
Because cottages are often multigenerational hubs, one grateful host suggests that the guest who patiently sits and chats - well, listens - to elderly family members is a wonderful addition. Also warmly welcomed is the visitor who pitches in with yard work, weed whacking her way into the hostess's heart. (Although there can be an S&M dynamic to that relationship - one friend's grandmother wickedly had a guest move all the heavy rocks one year and then had him move them all back the following year.) Learn how to be a handyman hero - our friend Ed fixed my mother-in-law's dock step and now Ed can do no wrong at the family cottage. We're jealous of Ed.
Quiet sex. Few cottages are soundproof, so gratitude goes to those who must but mute the lust.
Be game for everything - a great Scrabble or Boggle player is a huge hit, particularly if he doesn't, in a moment of superiority, speedily finish off the jigsaw puzzle and then gloat about it all weekend.
Skilled parenting is also widely admired at most cottages - parents who not only prevent their own kids of any age from being pouty non-participants but even tactfully help the hosts' kids take their behaviour up a notch.
And finally, who doesn't love cottage gushers - those who genuinely develop a crush on whosever cottage they are at, who congratulate the hosts over and over again on the location, the lake, the landscaping, the loons. Most people consider their cottage a paradise on Earth. So being the angel who loves it just as much as they do means you're guaranteed a heavenly callback. Unless of course you decide in the interval that you're really not cottage material.
Now, about that U-Haul. …