I hear guilt and defensiveness in the responses. I don't live in a 3,000 sq ft house (the size that Barbara Ehrenreich claims in Nickeled and Dimed in America that families go over to hired house cleaners), but it seems to me that one should take responsibility for what one owns, particularly in the Diaspora where y'all have two-day weekends.

I recall a woman saying, after having recently moved into her 3,000 sq ft house: "Five bathrooms. How'm I supposed to clean five bathrooms?!" Even as a teenager, something about that remark sounded off.

My folks hired a once-a-week cleaning woman, yet never asked either myself or my three siblings to lift a finger. Why couldn't we have been assigned the vacuming, ironing, and dusting? Has anyone thought about what message you send your kids when you hire someone else to clean your living space?

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