moral dilemma

forgot to mention that yesterday marked a big first in my life: until now, i have never paid someone to clean my house, and it feels fucking weird. i'm conflicted about it. it's sort of a class thing and a pride thing and a whole bunch of other horseshit.

anyways, she is a very pleasant middle-aged woman who came highly recommended. what my neighbourly referrals failed to mention is that our house cleaner is a raving religious nut. my jaw dropped when i drove past her car after having briefed her on my neurotic cleaning preferences - on the back of her car in practically flashing neon was a bumper sticker that reads "thank god your mom is pro-life". first of all, that kind of shit-flinging should really never ever be done from my driveway. but my more immediate thought was omigod, what DIDN'T i put away while i was frantically tidying up for the cleaning lady?! my mind was suddenly awash with visions of her accidentally knocking over my sandwich baggie of not-oregano and gasping "sinner!" or handling trojans with her face all-a-twisted as if they were dripped from the brow of satan himself ... i imagined finding a certain battery-powered device in my bedroom replaced with a statue of the virgin mary (a la magda on satc).

maybe it's unfair of me to assume that a seemingly meek pro-lifer would be that judgmental about things in my house that are none of her business. not that i really care. i guess i'm feeling uber-judgmental about her. i actually feel like she dirtied my space by cleaning it. this is a problem. i work and live here and happen to require a relatively clean environment. so the next time i have an emergency when my schedule is too crazy for me to be able to tidy up after furnace repair guys trapse across every square inch of my house in muddy workboots, will i be able to call the jesus freak? is our mutual passion for lemony fresh spic-n-span-ness strong enough to overcome the profound distance between us? i'm new to all this - do i have to respect the woman who scrubs my toilet?