The Foreign Service Journal, April 2006

merely to salve one’s conscience seems facile, self-defeating and not particularly helpful to anyone con- cerned. (It was a variation on this argument, by the way, that convinced me to hire a maid for the first time.) My sense is that, on the whole, the local household help in many coun- tries often prefer working for Ameri- can families precisely because we tend to employ all or some of these strategies, instinctively or otherwise, in dealing with their presence in our homes. Call it a humble pushing at the social boundaries, an irrepressible egalitarian impulse (mocked by many as naïve and even disingenuous, I real- ize), or real, rubber-hits-the-road democratization. Ironically, in some societies, where social stratifications go deeper than we can fathom, such efforts can be jar- ring even to their intended beneficia- ries. Following my wife’s knowing guidance, for example, I have re- frained from inviting the maid who currently lives and works in our home to sit at the table with us to share the dinner that she herself prepares — to avoid the dreadful confusion this could cause. At the same time, how- ever, we take care to emphasize that she should make herself at home in our shared home. Among other things, we tell her, this means she A P R I L 2 0 0 6 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 63 I suspect I’m not alone in my discomfort at the existence of a large class of people who live at the beck and call of a much smaller elite.