Sometimes Mrs Finnegan WISHES she wasn’t a housekeeper

Housework – usually performed by women – is the work that it is not noticed until it hasn’t be done.
I suspect that NO ONE in the history of time has EVER said:

That is a remarkably dust-free bit of wainstcoting.

OR

How well that blacking has been applied to the grate!

And if the labour is not noticed, the organiser of the work goes about her arduous tasks even more un-thanked and un-regarded. Who sings the song of the housekeeper?

I should have been a cook. She may be blamed when her soufflé sinks, but at least she is praised when it rises.

But I would rather have been a butler.

You should have seen the fuss downstairs on the day our new butler was due to arrive. All the maids made sure they had clean aprons on and the stable boy, who has been a stranger to a comb all his life, suddenly appeared with slicked back locks. Has he come yet? Has he come? Was all that could be heard. I did not LOWER myself to be drawn into such conversations. Really, how important can a man be if he is named after a green vegetable?

I did happen to notice a well-polished pair of shoes step up to the front door when I casually glanced out of the basement window while balancing on a chair. He was taken directly to the Mistress and 23 minutes later those same shoes were walking down the servants’ stairs to the housekeeper’s room.

Twenty three minutes! I don’t think I have spent more than three minutes with the Mistress at any time in my entire service. It doesn’t take long to say: Finnegan, where is my...; Finnegan, why haven’t you....or Finnegan, what were you thinking of?

Well-polished shoes stopped outside my door. I waited for Mr Broccoli-face to knock. He did. You can tell a lot from a man’s knock. This one was loud, but with a slight tremor of deference that I suspect others would not have noticed. Mr Parsley-features waited for me to respond.

The door swung open to reveal the latest recruit to the staff of The Regency Town House.

I remembered my manners.

Welcome, Mr Cubbage, I said.
And I didn’t let the word wig pass my lips.

Mrs Finnegan is the BOUDICA of Brunswick Square and housekeeper at Number13, The Regency Town House. Follow her adventures by adding your name HERE to her subscription service which is entirely free of fees and gratuities.

PS As I reflect on my role in life, I am convinced that only two women have understood my situation:

Mary Wollstonecroft when she wrote: if we revert to history, we shall find that the women who have distinguished themselves have neither been the most beautiful nor the most gentle of their sex.
Jean Marsh in everything she did. RIP