You wouldn’t believe some of the families that go on my cave tours. The children are a wreck. Not only does the child run the family, they also try to run my tour.
Can you imagine a grown man letting a 5 yr. old take command of a 28 person tour? I don’t let them.
At the beginning of my tours with rambunctious children, I ask the parents to keep the restless ones near the back of the tour. That way, if the child remains fussy, they can leave the tour easily.
But what happens sometimes, is that the mom will hold the crying child right in front of me, between the rest of the tour and myself. She will look at me and listen to my talk while her child wails. She is completely oblivious to the child’s screams, and the looks on the faces of the tour group show complete disgust.
Other tour guides look at me in horror when I say that I’ve kicked people off of my tour. “Ma’am, I’m sorry, but I can’t talk over the sound of your child. I’ll have to ask you to leave, and maybe we can try this another time.”
One time I did that, and the lady walked about 20 feet away, and stood there with her child screaming. The lady was still trying to listen to my talk. I stopped the tour again and said, “Really, I need you to go.” She slunk away with her still disruptive child.
When I have a kid like that on my tour, and other guides ask, “how was your tour?”, I tell them that I had a “T.W.” along for the ride.
“T.W.” stands for “Tour Wrecker”. When a Tour Wrecker comes along, you don’t get tips at the end of the tour. Even if you booted the little rascal out the door, people are left with a bad taste in their mouth, and aren’t the least bit generous to the guide at the end of the session.
Some guides put up with T.W.s, and just try to get through the 70 minute tour alive. But if the guide really cared about the group, and not just avoiding confrontation, we’d have more parents learning that their family needs to be socially gracious out in public.
There’s one group of people that I’ve never had even the slightest problem with as far as their children are concerned. Their kids stand quietly, listening and looking at the guide, and enjoying the cave. Perhaps the lazy parents should have their children spend some time with these other folks.
Who are these “other folks”? That would be the Amish.