I was grateful my mother wasn’t around so I didn’t have to explain my new, albeit temporary, career plans. I could almost see her furrowed brow and hear her horrified reaction to the word “Cleaning!”
Okay, it’s true, cleaning or, if you want more kudos, being a ‘Domestic Assistant’, is considered by many to be a demeaning and rather unenviable occupation. Indeed, even with a petrol allowance the salary isn’t going to go far, but I still think it is worth considering. It would be at least a welcome gesture towards the gas bill, and current numerous car repairs. The Agency is well organised, the work doesn’t sound too arduous and, for a middle age woman with complicated caring responsibilities, it has the glorious ‘F’ word, no not that one, flexibility, so nothing to lose. After a few sessions where a supervisor checks my capability and tactfully nudges me in the right direction, I’m ready sporting my uniform, with my box of tricks on my first mission with a colleague. You’d think there wouldn’t be much to it really, wafting a duster around, a mop here and there, nudging a vacuum into corners, but several surprising factors come to light.
Realistically, being based in Cheshire’s Golden Triangle my experience is probably a far cry from working in many other parts of the country in such a role. In the initial weeks I find myself working in a variety of homes but there is no doubt that I’ve had to mentally adjust to a fair number of palatial opulent residences hidden down picturesque country lanes. High walls, electric gates, and extensive security systems turn out to be a taster of what is to come. I park my Toy Town ‘Noddy’ car carefully between the four-by-fours and Ferrari on the driveway. Aside from immense space, wonderful views and unique architecture, I have to get my head round billiard rooms, in-house cinemas, saunas, jacuzzis, stables and guard dogs – it’s all there. I think I must have fallen into a TV film set and quite expect to find a body lying under the Steinway piano. Oh, and incidentally, the ‘meet and greet’ lady isn’t the owner after all, but the PA, the Personal Assistant, – stupid!
However, please don’t misunderstand me. I don’t have a problem with wealth – something which is always relative in any case. If people have worked hard and are successful, who I am to dictate how they spend it, and afterall they are trusting and employing me, and indeed an entourage of others to maintain their luxury lifestyle – gardeners, security staff, shoppers, car valets and so forth, so who am to complain? Am I green with envy? No. Although it would be nice to pay off the mortgage, have a holiday home and a reliable car, there’s a sort of familiar comfort in living in a slightly worn house, doing your own decorating, growing your own veg, having to balance finances to permit the odd holiday or save up for something special. I get a cheap thrill when someone makes a flattering comment about a jacket I’m wearing, knowing that I purchased it for next to nothing in a local charity shop. So, although my breath has been taken away on many occasions, and it has taken a few months for my pupil size to return to a normal dimension, I can honestly say that for the majority of time, I’m happy to stick with my lot.
I soon discover that timing is the name of the game when cleaning, and one of the first essential skills is to assess all the areas to be covered, so I don’t land up darting about like a month trapped in a dolls house, trying to sweep through three large rooms in the last fifteen minutes of the morning. Experience now tells me that kitchens, even small ones need a good half hour, more if there are dishes to clear initially, and black granite worksurfaces to polish – long live multi-coloured laminate! Bedrooms – allow about fifteen minutes with the exception of teenages rooms. You need more time for these because there is still not an electronic gadget that will pick up, fold and put clothes away for these poor exhausted creatures. These days many upmarket homes all have en suite bedrooms complete with miles of exotic tiles, spotted shower cubicals, all clamoring for a polish.. by… you know who. Oh, and by the way, men have just as many toiletries as their female partners these days.
Timing for dining rooms is often based on the number of chairs, their size and weight as each have to be laboriously moved back and forth beneath the table. For lounges and halls the type of flooring usually dictates the time required – stone, tile, wood, carpet, you name it. Having only operated a fairly old Dyson at home, I’m now fully qualified to work for Which? Consumer magazine. I’ve battled with the upright noisy, the reluctant retractable flex models, the superstrength suckers, the snail shaped quietly feeble, the quick cloggers, the awkward and heavy, the lightweight rotund… you name it. One extraordinary option involved plugging a hose into an elaborate central extraction system in the walls – seemed a lot of trouble just to avoid emptying the vacuum, and in reality a 1960’s dustette would have been as effective!
Owners, if they are around are pleasant enough but sometimes I feel bit of a trespasser, albeit an invited one, invading their personal space and lives. Afterall, from the moment you enter the hall you can’t help but observe not only the style of house and owner’s general affluence, but as you work your way round, all their personal possessions. Children’s playgroup splodge paintings on the fridge, school achievement certificates on the walls, misshapen clay pots on the mantlepiece, family photographs throughout the years, little treasured knick-knacks and music selection. Of course books – their quality, quantity and subject matter are also usually an accurate indicator of the owner’s intelligence and pursuits. Some homes are littered with foreign oddities from work and a life overseas, china or antiques. Others sport modern sculptures or object d’art limited editions. I’m grateful for the insurance policy on these occasions, one minor dusting slip could wipe out my salary for months!
Designer clothes, the names of which I’ve only seen on the catwalk or glossy magazines, are often strewn casually about despite extensive wardrobes, sorry, I mean dressing rooms. I’m beginning to feel bit of a frugal frump, and wondering how I’ve survived life without a vast collection of unique chic!
Laundry appears to be a great challenge to the Cheshire set. Practical, spacious utility rooms are often seriously awash (or not as the case may be), with mountains of laundry in different baskets. At first glance you might be fooled into thinking this is merely laundry at different stages of washing. But look again, and you’ll see poking out from the crumpled mountain, a man’s Gucci shirt, a lady’s Dior blouse, a daughter’s Armani jeans, a son’s muddy rugger shirt, a pair of jodhpurs, all mixed up with colourful underwear and a dog’s red and white Santa coat. Forget sorting into colour, textile, degrees of dirt, temperatures of wash, urgency of return, this family is drowning in a washtub wipeout! You wouldn’t think it would be that difficult for intelligent educated people to master this necessity, but I guess it must be low on their list of priorities.
The actual cleaning required in most homes is fairly reasonable. It’s not like the old days, no scrubbing floors on hands and knees, blacking the stove or polishing of silver, and it’d oddly satisfying leaving a home in a better state than it was in when you arrived. However, there are a few homes that are permanently spotless, where I’m frustratingly unable to make any mark on them, have difficulty seeing where I’ve cleaned, and what is still to be done. I can only hope the dear owners seek psychiatric help for their Obsessive Compulsive Disorder so my next visit isn’t as fruitless! Equally perplexing are owners who point out a miniscule amount of fluff behind the coal skuttle but are totally oblivious to the grey grime on every window sill, smeary mirrors and muddy footprints on the all too pale carpet.
I’ve realised that in today’s climate cleaning isn’t just for the desperate or dim. You’d be surprised at the former occupations and qualifications of cleaners these days which speaks volumes for today’s trying job market, and there’s still many a hardworking sole whose livelihood and that of their family, rely heavily on such positions.
Many years ago my grandmother’s gardener referred to her cleaner as “The woman what does” and this reference became bit of a family joke. So, to all those hard-working “woman what do”, allow me to salute you, with my mop and bucket in hand!
