To the young mother sitting across from me on the Acela:
Look, I know it’s tough to deal with a screaming toddler. We’ve all been there. Traveling with little ones can be really hard. I am pleased to be patient — to a point. If you would make some good-faith effort to calm the squalling kid beyond going “shhhh” every couple of minutes, it would be much, much easier to sympathize, and to be tolerant. But you are signaling to the rest of us that you don’t really care that your kid is screaming at the top of her lungs, endlessly, and how it might affect others. Again, I know it’s hard to control this kind of thing in kids as young as yours. But you’ve got to at least try. It shows that you have as much consideration for your fellow passengers as you want your fellow passengers to have for you.I know it’s not the Quiet Car, but come on, that doesn’t mean that this is the Scream Car either. Manners, madame, manners.
Thank you.
Sir Nicholas Winterton