Spick and span

Every two weeks, I pay a cleaning woman to clean my house.

It is intuitively clear to me that I must never be in my house while she is here.  She might feel hassled; I might feel awkward.  She charges me for three hours of work, to be done between 7:30 and 10:30 a.m..  I leave the house at 7 a.m., eat breakfast out, amuse myself in various ways, and return at 10:30 a.m.  She has come and gone. 

Does she actually work for three hours?  Or even occupy my house for three hours?   I have clearly made it impossible for me to ever know.  Before my cat died -- my very shy and skittish cat -- I was always surprised to find him asleep on a chair in the living room when I came back at 10:30.  The same cat that streaked upstairs and hid under my bed when anyone knocked on the door.  Peacefully asleep, as though nothing had disturbed him for some time.  But -- I told myself -- maybe, over time, he's just got used to her.  And to her vacuum cleaner.

She must not think me a slob, or raised by wolves.  This fear is paramount in my mind.  Therefore, I spend some time -- not hours, but some time -- cleaning the house before the cleaning woman arrives.  I learned this from my mother.  It never looks better than the hour shortly before she arrives.

What does she do?  Primarily, she drags the vacuum around the carpets, upstairs and down.  I know she does this, because I see the tracks.  I assume the vacuum is operating while she does so.  And she folds the ends of the toilet paper rolls into little triangles, as they do in hotels.

What else?  The mop is usually wet.  The hardwood and tile floors usually aren't, but, to be fair, they dry fast.  So they may well have dried before I arrive.  Especially if she mopped them at 8 a.m.  Before leaving at 9 a.m.

I'm always surprised at what she doesn't do.  I'm not fastidious.  Trust me.  A table can collect dust for weeks without my noticing.  And yet, I do notice that dust collects -- dust is really an understatement -- "dust" wedged into corners of the rooms she mops, where the mop doesn't easily dig it out with one swipe.  White painted stairway banisters get progressively more grimy each week.  Baseboards are never dusted.  Cobwebs -- small ones, but still -- remain in place long after abandoned by a resident spider.

I felt happier when I had a long-haired black cat.  He shed daily.  There was always cat hair on all the carpets.  It had to be cleaned up.  She knew it, and she did it.  (Except for one patch of hair under the coffee table in the living room, a patch that remained black and hairy for months after the cat died.  She finally -- thank God -- vacuumed under the table without my asking.) It was obvious -- comparing the carpets before and after her visit -- that she was doing something that needed doing.

Why don't I say something to her?  Rather than seethe and feel guilty for seething?  I could.  When I was taking weekly piano lessons, I finally pointed out that the white keys were becoming black, and she immediately cleaned them.  But who am I to tell her how to do her job?  She might get angry. Her feelings might be hurt. She might go home and yell at her boy friend, and I have nothing against her boy friend.

You may hate being an employee, having someone boss you around?  Believe me, you have it good.   I find it much more difficult to be an employer.