I spent 2 years cleaning houses. What I saw makes me never want to be rich.

Let me tell you something you already know: Your housekeeper spies on you.

We work alone. We get bored. What do you expect?

I worked for a company cleaning houses for two years. It was flexible. It paid well enough. I didn't think of it as a career, or identify with it; it was just what I did to get myself through college as a single mom.

At first I didn't snoop. When they set me off on my own with a white binder containing directions for each house, I just dropped my daughter off at day care and went.

I checked how many pills they'd taken and learned which prescriptions had turned into recreations

I found the houses on little winding roads, the hidden keys tucked under gnomes or rugs. I parked my car where it wouldn't drip oil on their driveway, lugged my tray of supplies inside, and called to clock in, standing by picture windows overlooking the ocean, looking at the perfectly manicured lawn, the chairs around the deck, the path down to the dock, and the boat that glittered even in the rain. I cleaned, and I moved on. I had 20 clients and two or three houses a day to get to, anyway.

But after a few months, my boss told me to clean slower. (We didn't call it that, of course. We called it "more detailed.") The company had a high turnover rate, she explained, and we billed by the hour. If I cleaned houses quicker than the girl who'd replace me, clients would want to continue paying the lower rate.

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