You can't catch poor, and an adult looks back at harriet the spy

For my Global Women's Issues class, we are reading Global Woman: Nannies, Maids, and Sex Workers in the New Economy edited by the fabulous Barbara Ehrenreich and Arlie Russell Hochschild. Ehrenreich's article mostly discussed the franchise maid industry (Merry Maids, The Maids--for which Anna worked for a while, etc.), and there's a lot about live-in nannies, mostly immigrant women. These articles caused so many things to run through my mind, but two appeared in particular.

Maids and cleaning services are apparently on the rise like crazy. The square-footage of people's houses is huge, almost normally at a point at which they can't handle the care themselves. Enter The Maids (or whoever). Sorry ass wages that do not count driving time and ending clean-up time and basic anonymity to the clients who pay a ton per hour, ostensibly assuming that the workers get this money. Wrong. Cleaning is considered one of the lowest occupations on the ladder, though it is necessary. People assume you are uneducated and somehow dirty and unworthy of any respect if you work in these jobs. Having briefly worked as a housekeeper in a hotel, I know all about this. You mention you cleaned hotel rooms (or anything) and a look of pity and/or horror creeps into the other person's face. It's like they think they can catch poor...

The second thought was about Harriet the Spy. This has been one of my very favorite books since I was like 10. The Nickelodeon movie was good, but anyway...what made me think of it is Golly, Harriet's nanny. As a kid, you just think "wow, Golly is super cool" (even if she isn't supposed to look like Rosie O'Donnell, who plays her in the flick), and her mom kinda sucks. Thinking back, you see the ridiculous way she was fired. (She had been with the family since Harriet was born, and they fired her based on one incident, which was way overblown in the first place.) Then you see her visiting her mother, who was apparently mentally incapacitated in some way (cut out of the movie completely), and Golly only got to see her once in a while because of her hours with the Welsch's. It seems almost idyllic to a kid. Parents kinda distant to the point that they leave you alone and an awesome nanny to give cool advice and such. As an adult, you see how Golly was exploited and the issues surrounding live-in nannies, even if Golly was white...

just some thoughts....