DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am divorcing my husband due to his emotional abuse. Members of his large family have all immediately ceased contact with me. I understand this is typical, but we were close for over a decade, and their complete ostracism of me has been painful.

I wonder how best to react, should we run into one another accidentally in the future. Knowing them, I would anticipate they would be friendly and will pretend goodwill, and will say things like, “We should have lunch!” -- when, of course, they don’t mean it for a second. I, of course, will be polite and smile, but the thought of such a scenario sickens me.

What are good manners for dealing with people who pretend to be positive toward you, but have actually hurt you deeply? They will expect a smile from me, and pleasure to see them, but it will truly be a painful moment for me.

GENTLE READER: Would you feel better if they said something cutting to you? Or cut you dead?

Sincerity is not always the most bearable approach in an emotionally difficult situation. Miss Manners agrees that it would be preferable to omit the luncheon suggestion if there is no such intention, even though that expression has become a conventional way of conveying goodwill without commitment.

But although the manners you describe may be insincere, surely they are preferable to the possible sincere manners between estranged people who may harbor thoughts that are best not aired.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am a teenage girl belonging to a large family. Often, at social events or brief meetings, acquaintances and friends will compliment me or one of my siblings, but address the comment to my parents.

Sometimes, I will be with one of my parents, and someone will approach and comment: “Your eldest daughter is so beautiful” (or some such kind compliment). They are speaking to my parents, but they are speaking of me, and are aware of my presence.

I do not know how I ought to reply. On one hand, they are addressing my parents, and interrupting is impolite; yet on the other hand, they are complimenting me, and it is polite to receive compliments graciously.

This has happened several times, and I wish to meet such kindness properly. Sometimes I offer a demure smile, blushing, and dip my head. Other times I murmur thanks such as, “Oh, how kind of you,” warmly, and then retreat so they can converse with my parent. I don’t think either is quite rude, but please tell me the most polite response.

GENTLE READER: Not only are you handling this gracefully, but you are preparing yourself for a lifetime of recognition for any success you may achieve.

Whether you go on to win an Oscar, a Medal of Honor or a Nobel Prize, Miss Manners assures you that such modest dipping of your head, along with murmured thanks and, if you can achieve it, a blush, will further charm those who admire you.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: When I extend an invitation, and the response I receive ends in “but I think I’ll pass,” I find it a bit rude. Am I being oversensitive? Is that a perfectly acceptable response?

If you decide to respond with “Thanks for the question, but I think I’ll pass,” I will never stop laughing.

GENTLE READER: Tempting. But Miss Manners is in full agreement with you. This phrase might be one of the rudest she has ever heard. Not only is it nastily dismissive, but its implication is that the invitation does not live up to the recipient’s standards -- or that the issuer is hiding something better. Either way, Miss Manners suggests you take a pass on extending further ones.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband and I are friends with a couple who live about an hour away from us. Whenever they invite us to their home for dinner, they always ask us to stay the night as well (presumably because of the long drive). While I believe this is a generous gesture, sometimes I would just rather sleep in my own bed.

I know that I can decline if I wish. My problem is that when we invite them to our house, they expect that it includes an overnight stay, and they don’t usually leave until noon the next day. I am getting tired of the notion that a dinner invitation necessarily includes overnight accommodations.

Am I being unreasonable to think that an hour isn’t too long a drive at 9 or 10 at night, and that people can temper their alcohol intake accordingly?

GENTLE READER: Probably, yes. Try as you might (and Miss Manners has mightily tried), you cannot control other people’s actions. You can only control how you issue the invitations.

“We would love to have you and Horace over for supper, but we are afraid that we have an early morning the next day and must make it only for the evening.” And if another date is suggested: “And that night too.” “And that night too.” “And that night too.”

DEAR MISS MANNERS: After years of therapy, I made the choice to end all contact with my mother. It has been almost five years since I’ve spoken with her. On occasion, I run into people who know us both, but are unaware of our circumstances; they will ask how she is or tell me to tell her they said “hello.” I also had the experience of a new colleague, whose mother I have met, asking me a question about my mother.

How would you recommend I respond to these questions? I do not want to launch into the entire saga with acquaintances, nor do I want to mislead them into thinking she is no longer with us.

GENTLE READER: Those who have your mother’s information can be told, “I’m sure she would love to hear from you directly.” Those who do not can be given suitably vague descriptions of what you do know, before changing the subject: “I haven’t spoken to her for a while, but I hear that they are having an unusually dry summer out there. How has the summer treated you?”

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: This past winter, I stopped going to most of my usual activities to try to avoid catching the flu. I was successful until the end of February, when I caught something (ironically, not the flu) that put me in the hospital for a week.

I’m still not able to resume normal activities because of medication side effects, and the condition that developed may be permanent. I am very upset -- understandably, I think.

I can’t prove it, of course, but my guess is that I caught the “something” from a worker at a small local business (the one-person post office) who was very ill, which I discovered when I took a chance and went in there about three days before I got sick.

At the time, I commented to her that she should have stayed home, and she pleasantly agreed that maybe she should have. I’m thinking that she probably infected more people, although hopefully without the extreme issues I experienced.

I would very much like to communicate this to the worker, but I don’t know whether it’s really possible or appropriate. I’m not planning on going to that location again, but I don’t think that would be significant to her.

Can I, and should I, report this to the worker? It’s a real-life example of why people should stay home when they are sick, but nobody pays any attention anyway!

GENTLE READER: And what if you are wrong? How do you plan to prove it?

While Miss Manners is sorry that you got sick -- and agrees that contagious people should, to the best of their abilities, avoid being out in public -- she finds the need to target Patient Zero unpleasant as well as unprovable. Also, there is no way to gauge how one person may be differently affected by another’s symptoms.

In the unlikely event that you run into this postal worker again, you might say, “Oh, I hope your sickness did not turn out to be as bad as mine -- and that you didn’t have to miss too much work. I was in the hospital for days.”

DEAR MISS MANNERS: When the lovely people at my workplace want to show their appreciation of my work, they give me a gift card to a well-known online company that is rapidly putting independent booksellers out of business.

My husband runs an independent bookstore. The folks at my work know what my husband does, but have clearly not put two and two together to realize that this gift will make me deeply unhappy and give my husband ulcers.

What would be the best way, in my thank-you letter, to express appreciation for their generosity while requesting that in future, they choose virtually any other gift in the world -- or none at all?

GENTLE READER: Most online book companies inexplicably sell things other than books. If this one does, you could say in your letter, “We greatly look forward to using this card for novelty sweets or toys for our dogs.”

If questioned about why you would not want to get books, Miss Manners recommends you say, “Oh, my husband already owns an independent bookstore. Happily, we can get everything we need there.”

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)