Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here.

Dear Care and Feeding,

My wife “Dana” and I went on an overseas vacation last month and asked her sister “Athena” to water our plants and feed our fish while we were away. Dana and I are avid coffee connoisseurs and had purchased a $400 bag of a rare type of coffee just prior to our trip.

When we returned, I found the container of coffee was missing. I called Athena to ask if she knew anything about it. She sheepishly admitted to bringing along her 3-year-old nephew, whom she had been watching on one of the days she had to come over. She left him to his own devices for 10 minutes while she took care of the watering and feeding. When she returned to the kitchen, she discovered that he had pulled a bunch of things out of the cupboards and scattered the coffee all over the floor.

Athena apologized and offered to replace the coffee until she learned how much it cost. She promptly did an about-face and said she wasn’t paying for “an accident.” Even worse, Dana is now asking me to let it slide. Her sister is well aware that our house isn’t childproofed and did not have permission to bring a toddler over without us present. Frankly, she is lucky her nephew didn’t get into something worse. We were looking forward to enjoying that coffee and I want my SIL to pay us for the little shit destroying it. My request to have her pay us back for something that was ruined due to her negligence is perfectly reasonable, right?

—Coffee Clusterfuck

Dear Coffee Clusterfuck,

Athena was doing you a favor while you were away. She also had to watch her nephew, because the rest of her life and her other responsibilities don’t cease just because she’s doing you a favor. I wouldn’t have left a 3-year-old unattended in someone else’s kitchen, for all sorts of reasons. But I also wouldn’t call a 3-year-old names or start a feud with a close family member over $400 worth of coffee. How much bad blood are you really willing to create over coffee that, even if expensive, can be replaced? If Dana and Athena both want to move on now, it’s probably because their relationship is more important to them than coffee beans. I suggest you try to respect that and move on as well.

—Nicole

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