When you grow up in the South, there are a couple of etiquette lessons you learn intuitively — and one, which Jarrett "JT" Thomas clearly missed out on somewhere along the line, is to never gift a woman over a certain age a cane (even as a joke).
During Season 10, Episode 1 of Southern Charm, which aired December 5, JT learned this lesson firsthand when he decided to present Patricia Altschul with a walking stick as a gift. Because he was using a cane (he'd previously hurt his leg in an ATV accident while vacationing in Costa Rica), JT decided to bring all of his fellow cast members similar tools so they could match at the Carolina Cup. Understandably, the show's grande dame didn't appreciate the gift as much as some other recipients.
"I don't need a cane," she said when he handed it to her.
And though she grabbed it and said "thank you," she made a face at her friends to show her displeasure.
"I am genuinely offended. What's next, a wheelchair?" she said in a confessional. "I don't know what the hell he was thinking. Kind of a stupid gift, in my estimation."
When JT sat down the group, Patricia decided it was time to get up and leave ... sans cane.
"She turned my cane down. That's savage," said JT. Meanwhile, Patricia commented on the situation herself as she walked away: "I felt like saying, 'Take this cane and shove it,'" she said.
The Southern Charm cast's reactions to JT's cane gift
Unfortunately, JT was the only one who missed the memo on a cane being a bad "gift" for Patricia.
"Like, what the f-ck are you doing?" said Madison LeCroy in a confessional. "He'll learn his lesson."
And though Venita Aspen adores JT, she couldn't stand by him in that situation, either.
"You don't give a woman past a certain age a cane, even if it's bedazzled with jewels from Harry Winston," she said in her own interview. "I wish JT would have talked to me first, like he does with almost everything else."
