Afternoon:
11°c
WORRYING news via a text. My cleaner, Agnes, is taking an impromptu trip home to Poland. She'll be back in a fortnight, she assures me, but I can't help feeling a surge of anxiety. What if this confounded credit crunch has seen her off?
My fears have foundation. This week directory enquiries produced an inadvertent snapshot of how Britain has changed this last year. Requests have fallen sharply for cleaners' numbers, down 65 per cent in 12 months. Everyone is spending their spare cash on pizza (up 97 per cent) instead. Have they lost their marbles?
I'd happily never eat takeaway again if it meant I could keep my cleaner. As well as polishing the bread-bin and vacuuming up the cat-hair, Agnes is the reason my relationship endures.
Working long hours in London, where a daily commute and a few late nights a week are the norm, means domestic chores fall off your list of priorities. Most nights I barely have the energy to put the jar of pesto in the fridge before passing out with exhaustion. In the morning it's a race against the rush hour to hit the bus stop before 7.15am. I might shove a load of washing in the machine, or empty the compost bucket, but any tasks involving serious hygiene, such as washing a floor or bleaching a sink - forget it.
If it weren't for Agnes's end-of-week visits, my weekends would go back to their depressing round of drudgery - the dragging of vacuums and spritzing of surfaces that sap the soul and, when left undone, provide a fertile breeding ground for domestic disputes.
Unwiped crumbs, stacked dishes and dirty laundry are stored up as ammunition for the sex wars. My partner has an uncanny ability to name the exact date and time I last did the washing-up, while I know with a righteous certainty he hasn't swept out the ashes once this year.
Agnes polishes away these tensions with her magic duster and can of Pledge. She cleans into the corners of our life and stacks bills in piles that act as neat financial reminders. She will even rearrange my furniture to give us more space.
So as I wield the pen of prudence over our monthly outgoings, my gym membership, the fortnightly curry, our organic vegetable box are all at stake. But not Agnes. My domestic goddess is worth her weight in gold.
Reader views (7)
I agree with Charlotte, why should cleaning the house be a priority, especially when she works long hours... Why shouldn't she be allowed to put her feet up at week-ends?! I didn't feel Charlotte thought cleaning was beneath her, but it is exhausting and boring. For Agnes though, it's a job.
- Mirela, Kent
It's really distasteful that two apparently healthy adults without children feel that cleaning up their own mess is beneath them. The 'depressing round of drudgery' is best left apparently to an economic and social inferior who of course won't mind the soul-sapping nature of her work.
- Paul, London
See, now I wouldn't have mentioned having a cleaner at this point - most of us do our own cleaning, you know.
- Amber, London
gym membership, take out food, cleaner - the self-centred self-indulgent generation incapable of assuming responsibility for life. Let's hope there isn't a war.
- Bianca, paris
You employ a cleaner, but have no dishwasher? Astonishing. Are you from the 19th century?
- Stephen, Basel, Switzerland
Do your own cleaning.... lazy or what!
- Don, London
she certainly will be worth her weight in gold if her bags are full of any of your valubles ! 
- Peter Ex Londoner, Hartlepool
