Free Gunn's Golden Rules by Tim Gunn, Ada Calhoun Page A

was in a stroller. To my shock and horror, the woman entered the path of moving traffic usingthe child’s stroller as a battering ram with the full intention of crossing the street no matter what.
    The older child, her daughter of about four, was by her side, but the onslaught of traffic clearly frightened the little girl to a point of total paralysis. She stood in the middle of the street while a car screeched to a halt a mere foot from her. Her mother, now successfully across the street, returned to her, yanking the now sobbing child by the arm, yelling, “When the sign says ‘Don’t Walk,’ it means
run
!”
    I was shaken by the incident and felt bad that I hadn’t done anything to stop it. Should I have run to the child’s rescue? Should I have scolded the mother?
    As a nonparent myself, I never want to assume I know better than a child’s own mother or father, but sometimes even those of us without kids can identify dangerous behavior. The parents I have relayed this story to agree that it seems pretty psychotic. They also typically enjoy the following story, about the ultimate in permissive parenting.
    I was walking home on Broadway from the Ninety-sixth Street subway station. It was one of those rare summer nights in the city when the temperature is bearable, the humidity low, and sweet air wafts in from Central and Riverside parks.
    All the restaurants with sidewalk tables were full and boisterous. Everyone was happy to escape air-conditioning.
    A few blocks from my apartment, I saw a young boy of three or four walk up to a table of al fresco diners. He greedily grabbed some pasta with red sauce off one stunned woman’s plate and proceeded to eat it with both hands.
    The boy’s mother spoke to her son about the incident, but not with the admonition that I was expecting, which would have gone something like this: “Stop! What are you doing?That is not your food! Apologize to these diners at once. You are in trouble, young man!”
    Instead, she took a napkin from an empty table, wiped his hands, and said, “Darling, if you like that, then we’ll go inside and get some to take home.” She never even acknowledged the diners!
    Every time I walk by that restaurant, I wonder, Where are that mother and son right now? I would say this child was doomed to grow up to be a social outcast, but it’s altogether possible he will grow up to be a star. I see a lot of similarly terrible behavior on sets.
    A celebrity who shall remain nameless announces to an underling, “I’d like a Diet Coke. I want a twelve-ounce glass and five ice cubes, each no bigger than three-quarters of an inch in length.” Once the Diet Coke arrives, the celebrity says, “These ice cubes are at least an inch, and I count six. This is unacceptable.” And
fling!
He throws the drink across the room.
    In academia, too, you see this kind of outrageous behavior. I knew a dean who had soup delivered to his office. I once saw him bring a spoonful up to his mouth, scream, “This soup isn’t hot enough!” and hurl the container across his office onto a wall, which I noticed already had stains on it.
    Is this really happening?
I thought. But I was glad I saw it, because if someone had told me the story, I would say it couldn’t possibly be true.
    What enables this kind of behavior? What allows people to think that they are permitted to behave that way?
    Don’t even get me started on Isaac Mizrahi. In my view, he’s one of the world’s biggest divas.
    One time, Isaac threw a fit about a security guard from the second-floor showroom at Liz Claiborne Inc.’s Times Squareoffices. Why, you may ask? Was he stealing? Harassing guests? Showing up late? No,
he was wearing brown.
    Can you imagine having your senses so offended by something that it provokes such an extreme reaction?
    You just never know what’s going to set people off. One time when I was on Martha Stewart’s show, she visited me in the greenroom. I threw out my arms to embrace her, but