Ah, The Summertime Joys Of A Cold, Impersonal Roadside Motel
'Click here for a note from Humphrey, the world's favorite inn cat.'
That, I'm very sorry to say, is an actual link on the Web site of a bed and breakfast on the way to my in-laws' cottage. Every year around this time my wife and I plan the route from our house to my in-laws', and every year we find ourselves wondering: what on earth is it about the innkeeping business that accounts for its fatal fascination with the cutesy-poo?
'In her spare time, Kathy enjoys reading, sewing, and collecting strawberry items, angels and other interesting collectables.' Of course she does. I have a brochure here from another B&B, this one in Kansas, whose logo is a fat, pink cherub alongside a cow. Angels exercise a fatal fascination upon the owners of beds and breakfasts, second only to teddy bears. Travelling through Vermont, I once stumbled upon a B&B called the Teddy Bear Inn, whose owners covered their lawns with dozens of miniature Adirondack chairs with teddy bears on them. And alas, it's not unique. There are Teddy Bear Inns strewn all the way from Vermont to Oregon -- in fact, the Web site of the Oregon Teddy Bear Inn offers a 15% discount to anyone who can count all the bears pictured there.
A friend of mine from New York used to travel regularly to Vermont on business. He always stayed at the same place: a Motel 6, 30 minutes by cab from his destination. Wasn't that inconvenient? I asked him. Not nearly as inconvenient,
he replied, as staying at the bed & breakfast in town, and being awoken at seven in the morning by the innkeeper knocking on the door and shouting, 'Fresh muffins, by cracky'
The dark obverse of the cutesy-poo personality is its authoritarianism. 'We ring the chimes to let our guests know when breakfast is ready,' a Pennsylvania B&B says. At the Motel 6, you get breakfast when you want it, you're permitted to start the day with plain toast instead of double-fudge muffins, and you're even allowed to read the newspaper while eating. But B&B keepers -- who have been up since dawn preparing their banana fritters and bacon pie and pineapple blintzes -- are irked by such antisocial behavior.
Shortly after we were married, my wife and I attended the wedding of a friend in a small Ontario town. Accommodation was tight, and we were booked into the local B&B, managed by a twittery woman who sat at the head of a long breakfast table and motioned to every guest to join her as they came downstairs.
We allowed ourselves to be bullied the first morning, and sat down where she indicated. All through the meal she demanded, with a significant leer, to know whether we had enjoyed our night. The next morning, we skulked downstairs and bolted for the door, hoping to make it to the local diner. She was too quick for us, intercepted us at the door, and steered us to her table. 'Oh, of course: you two lovebirds want to be alone.' And then she hovered over our table, winking at us, until we accepted our defeat, and invited her to sit down and tell us the story of her life.
I know thousands of people enjoy this sort of hospitality, but I always find something rather ominous about the ads that tell me how friendly the owners of a B&B are. All too many of these places should be termed a B&B&A -- bed and breakfast and autobiography: 'For ReRe, [yes, that's her name] owning the Brickyard Barn Inn is an opportunity to indulge her decided flair for professional and private entertaining.' 'Several of Andy's siblings live in or around Topeka.'
We live in a world that is all too often cold and impersonal. But I can't help wondering whether there isn't some sensible middle way between impersonality and having a hotel manager tell me where each and every one of his brothers and sisters can be found. If there isn't -- if we really must choose one extreme or the other -- then reserve a room at the Motel 6 for me alongside my misanthropic friend. And you can pass my serving of sour-cream turnovers and honey-glazed dumplings to Humphrey the cat.
Originally published in The Financial Post