DEAR ABBY: My friend and I read your column and discuss the letters and your replies. We usually agree with your answers. Now we have a question for you:

Let's say that "Mary" was shopping and ran into a young woman she had known in college -- we'll call her Beatrice. Beatrice had her 2-year-old son in a stroller, and when Mary looked at the little boy, she wasn't prepared for the shock she got. The child's face was terribly deformed and disfigured!

What should Mary have said -- if anything?

My friend said, "I would have ignored the abnormality and said something like, 'My, what a sweet child. How old is he?'"

I said, "I would have been more honest and said something like, 'I'm sorry about your baby, but I hear they are able to do amazing reconstructive surgery now.'"

Abby, what do you think a parent of a facially disfigured child would want to hear? My friend and I are hoping you will respond in your column. It would be helpful to many readers. -- NO NAME OR CITY, PLEASE

DEAR NO NAME: Just when I think I've seen everything, along comes a letter such as this one.

Only a person who has walked that path is qualified to answer that question. I hope someone who has will write and let me know. The answer would be helpful to many readers -- as well as to this columnist.

DEAR ABBY: I have a friend who insists he is not addicted to tobacco because he doesn't smoke cigarettes -- he smokes a pipe! He says, "I don't inhale, so a pipe can't hurt me."

Meanwhile, his wife inhales his secondhand smoke all day, and it must hurt because she has a respiratory problem and a chronic cough. This man claims he doesn't have a habit, yet he is never seen without some kind of pipe -- which he constantly is lighting, packing with tobacco, tapping into an ashtray or fiddling with in some manner.

He has a very impressive collection of pipes as well as a variety of fancy blends of tobacco, so it's apparent that he is not just a casual smoker. He brags that he could quit his pipe tomorrow and never miss it because he really doesn't have a habit.

Abby, I wonder whom is he kidding? -- AN OBSERVER

DEAR OBSERVER: Himself.

DEAR ABBY: The heartwarming letters you have published about people doing kind deeds impulsively for strangers prompts my first Dear Abby letter.

Every Saturday night, no matter what my husband and I did, we would always wind up at Baskin-Robbins for ice- cream cones. The same young girl always waited on Bob while I sat in the car -- a '66 T-Bird.

One night, with no warning whatsoever, my husband died of a heart attack. Although we had been married for 45 years, I was devastated.

About two months after my husband's death, I stopped by Baskin-Robbins for an ice-cream cone. The young girl remembered me because of the car, and said, "I've missed you. Where is your nice husband?"

I told her that he had died suddenly. "Oh, I'm very sorry," she said. "Please, wait a minute." Then she hurriedly packed a quart of our favorite flavor and handed it to me.

"No charge," she said softly. "Your husband was such a fine gentleman."

I was so touched, I cried. -- VIRGINIA DARE LUDWIG, TUSTIN, CALIF.

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DEAR ABBY: I have a suggestion for your readers. Tell them to urge their parents to identify the photos of their ancestors. When our parents died, my sister and I had no idea who was in the photographs we were left.

Fortunately, my sister traveled to Denmark and was able to get in touch with relatives who could identify the people. -- MARILYN BIRD, ROSE CITY, MICH.

DEAR MARILYN: I couldn't agree more. A few years ago, I received this letter that dealt with the problem:

DEAR ABBY: You suggested that "older people" should mark the backs of family pictures while they can still remember who's who, when the pictures were taken and the approximate dates. Why only "older people"? That's something everybody should do as soon as a snapshot is developed.

For years, I was too busy (or too lazy) to do it, and now that I'm retired and have plenty of time, I can't remember who half the people are.

My parents can't help me because my father has been dead for 25 years, and my mother is in a rest home, unable to remember much of anything.

So here I sit, with a big box of family pictures -- beating my brains out trying to recall names, dates and places. What a mess!

Abby, please remind your readers often to label their pictures. Then their grandchildren won't have to go through what I'm going through now. -- KICKING MYSELF IN ASBURY PARK

DEAR KICKING: Not only should family pictures be labeled, but accounts of historical events and newspaper clippings of births, graduations, marriages and deaths in the family should be preserved in a sturdy scrapbook.

Fascinating family histories could be preserved if younger members interviewed older relatives at family gatherings. A tape recorder would be ideal for this purpose.

Succeeding generations will love it!

DEAR ABBY: My husband and I disagee on how our children should address their elders. My husband and his family feel that children should always address adults as "Mr. or Mrs. So and So," regardless of the adult's preference -- otherwise the child will not learn to respect adults.

What is your opinion? Should my children address you as "Miss Van Buren" even though you ask them to call you "Dear Abby"? -- PREFERS FIRST NAME

DEAR PREFERS: To show respect to an adult, one addresses that person as he/she asks to be addressed.

If a man named "Rudolph" says, "Please call me Rudy," to ignore his request and call him "Rudolph" would be rude.

DEAR ABBY: Regarding thank-you notes: I believe I received the tackiest thank-you note ever -- my canceled check with "thank you" written in the "memo" space. -- APPALLED IN SODUS, N.Y.

By popular request, Abby shares more of her favorite prize-winning, easy-to-prepare recipes. To order, send a long, business-size, self-addressed envelope, plus check or money order for $3.95 ($4.50 in Canada) to: More Favorite Recipes by Dear Abby, P.O. Box 447, Mount Morris, Ill. 61054. (Postage is included.)

DEAR ABBY: I've been reading your column since I was a pre-teen girl. I'm 21 and a college senior now. In my freshman year, I met a super guy, "Ray." We hit it off immediately and have been best friends ever since. Abby, Ray was my first love. There was a strong physical attraction between us (we even discussed it), but we didn't act on it for fear of jeopardizing our precious friendship.

Since we met four years ago, I've dated others, lived with someone else, and now Ray has a girlfriend. She is his first serious relationship. Now I am wondering if I should let him know that I am still in love with him. We still are very close friends, and I honestly believe that we could make it as a couple.

I don't expect him to drop his girlfriend for me. However, I cannot spend the rest of my life wondering what might have been had I been willing to risk telling him my feelings.

What do you say, Abby? -- "WHAT IF" IN SACRAMENTO

DEAR WHAT IF: Now that Ray is involved in his first serious relationship, were you to tell him that you are still in love with him, it would cause him no end of consternation. Please, give him a break and put your "true confessions" on hold until you know where Ray's present relationship is going. Should it not endure, and he is free to consider another love relationship, unleash your "confession." But not until.

DEAR ABBY: I am stumped as to what to do about something that happened at work. As a junior executive in a large firm, I submitted an idea to a vice president. He reacted with very little enthusiasm, so I assumed he didn't think much of my suggestion.

About a week later, he showed my idea to the president of the company as though he had originated it. The president thought it was brilliant.

I was furious when I heard what had happened and I wanted to tell my friend a thing or two. However, I took a co-worker's advice to just keep quiet, as any further action on my part could be harmful to my career.

I am still very resentful, seeing his career flourish and not my own. Any advice? -- HAD IT WITH OFFICE POLITICS

DEAR HAD IT: I think you used good judgment in taking your co-worker's advice. Let it go -- and learn from the experience. And the next time you get a "brilliant" idea, submit it to the president yourself.

DEAR ABBY: My husband and I just returned from the beach -- our first outing this season. It was a beautiful sunny day in Santa Monica, and the beaches were swarming with men, women and children. I had seen some ads of the new skimpy bikini bathing suits for women, but this is the first time I had seen them worn by real people.

Abby, from behind, some of those women appeared to be naked -- with just a wee little string back there, barely visible, attached to a small patch of fabric in the front, no bigger than a Band-Aid.

I am not some crotchety old woman; I'm 35 years old, but I must admit, seeing so much flesh exposed, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. (My husband laughed.) -- EUGENIA

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