Mrs. Aech’s cleaning lady

To this day, even on a long weekend, she could not get out of bed and just leave the blankets in a tangled mess. Her husband would tease her about her "hospital corners," neatly tucked in a square, the pillow just so, smoothed over twice and then once more, in expectation of an inspection which no longer came.

(There is a part of the mind that stays, forever, in boarding school. No matter where the legs may carry the jelly of the brain over the years, some thoughts remain like a fly in amber.)

She knew this was neurotic, but the habit was too ingrained in her. She couldn’t even bother trying to change it. The day just didn’t seem normal unless this little chore was done. It was a compulsion, sort of like piously refusing to shop on a Sunday, or – God forbid – going to a Blues bar on riotous Cajun night. One of her friends had done the latter, afterward becoming consumed with what she termed "Catholic guilt." It was a term that she, actually an Anglican, had acquired from the Catholic boarding school kids.

"Why do we have Catholic guilt when we’re Anglican?" we would laugh together. But beneath the joking was a kind of sadness, for such times reminded us of our mingled feelings over having acquired such a disciplined life from years of boarding school.

"Because being Catholic is really not that different from being Anglican," I told my friend. "You’re probably going to be struck by lightning any minute now. Mrs. Aech is turning in her grave."

It all seems to stem from that place, and from Mrs. Aech (not her true name, for Inuit shouldn't speak badly of the dead, even though it's hard to apply that to someone who called you and your friends "whores of Babylon"). Unfortunately, I didn't manage to escape without my own share of our so-called Catholic guilt. And for us Inuit kids of the Anglican residential school kids, there was never any confession we could attend in order to remove it.

(But I do pretty good hospital corners.)

I probably have a leg up on my neurosis, though. You see, I have a bit of a special understanding of our harsh upbringing. I once gained a glimpse, a very small one, into the private lives of Mr. and Mrs. Aech, our residential school’s supreme authorities. It was not in a close, personal way, or even in an accidental way. It was gained in more of a covert, snooping way.

As a girl in Inuvik, I needed to make petty cash in order to cover such sinful necessities as make-up and nylons (the bane of dressing for dinner, but I digress); sometimes, it was simply in order to take my friends out for an occasional coke, a plate of fries, or a movie. So I became Mrs. Aech’s cleaning lady, working once a week on Saturdays, from 0900 to 1400 hrs.

(Or however long it took to finish polishing the silver.)

Mr. and Mrs. Aech lived on the second floor of the staff quarters at Stringer Hall. Their place was fairly large, with a generous living room, bedroom, a couple of bathrooms. I scrubbed both the bathrooms, changed linen, dusted and vacuumed, all in five hours or less. Oh yes, there was also the silver, which had to be polished, just as each piece of artwork in the living room had to be carefully dusted.

In the huge living room, a grand polar bear rug – which must have been at least ten feet long – commanded the attention of anyone who entered. I didn’t have to clean that, but I did have to scrub all the base boards around it.

I must have been an industrious little thing, as I never got any complaints. Once in a while, Mrs. Aech would hold a spot check.

We senior girls were never permitted to know Mrs. Aech very well. She seemed a lot kinder to the boys at Stringer Hall, but never really warmed to us. She was distant, cold, constantly disapproving. Herein, I won’t mention the sorts of nasty names we had for her (firstly, out of respect for her having passed away; secondly, because I've already done so in other articles). Needless to say, she was tough. For example, we all regularly had to kneel in front of her, so that she could inspect out skirt lengths, which could be exactly no higher than four inches above the knee. Blue eye shadow and mascara were frowned upon, as was as overly sprayed hair. She constantly reminded us that such things were carcinogenic. Runs in your nylons were a definite no-no. Certainly, being even five minutes late for supper – for which we all had to don dresses – could get you "CB’ed" (confined to barracks). We were held to militaristic standards of tidiness.

(You have no idea how few rules I’m outlining here.)

I didn’t want to be a snoop, but remember that – to us kids – Mr. and Mrs. Aech had always held a status akin to that of titans. From the time the government separated us from our families, sealing us away in the residential school that was to train us to behave like "decent" whites, there had been certain adults placed in charge of every detail of our lives. As anyone knows, every zoo consists of two classes of being: animal and keeper. Mr. Aech was the supreme keeper – the Overlord, if you will, his domain the institution itself. But make no mistake: he was a stern but kindly man, and I think he really believed all that crap about preparing us for a better life.

Mrs. Aech, however, was a bit more of a paradox, seemingly remote in her dislike for us girls, yet at once intimate in the sense that she was our supervisor, the person whose eyes were upon every individual action.

She was, still is, an enigma – how could I not take the chance to learn more about her while cleaning her home?

So, as I observed her belongings, I tried to get a feel for the kind of person she was, the sorts of things she liked. Immediately, I noticed that there were few photos of family, children or otherwise. The Aech's both seemed to possess a great fondness for Aboriginal art, Inuit and Dene. They owned a massive collection, which, to me, bespoke an affection for anything northern. From what I could see of their things, they had lived and worked in the North for a very long time.

Mrs. Aech liked silver. All of her housewares were of REAL silver, and she had more than a few items that were made of the stuff. Between all the silverware (much of which was probably antique) and the art pieces, my guess is that the contents of that house would be worth a small fortune today.

On top of her dresser, she had collected some foreign and expensive-looking perfumes in odd little bottles. This was strange, as I had never smelled any on her. She always smelled of laundry detergent and powder. As I was dusting, I also peeked at her lipstick. She seemed to like deep reds – the kind you saw on movie stars in old, old flicks. Again, I don’t remember her wearing any.

(She liked her chocolates.)

It was a good thing that their two gigantic St. Bernard dogs were locked downstairs as I cleaned; they might not have approved of me poking around. Other pets included many birds, which Mrs. Aech kept in her office. Mr. Aech kept a tank of exotic fish (I gave him my own pet fish a year later, for safekeeping, since the Fort MacPherson girls were deliberately butting cigarettes in the tank). And now that I think about it, how did the Aechs get those animals up north?

I’m not sure what I'd hoped to reveal to myself regarding Mrs. Aech, but other than discerning that she was a normal human, I merely deepened the mystery around her. I learned only that she indeed possessed a private self, but that self was as nebulous as the one I already knew.

When I finally left residential school, I gave the Aech's a black vase I had made in art class. My feelings, even then, were mixed: In part, it was an act of atonement, more of that guilt again, for peering into their lives (even though they never seemed to mind scrutinizing mine). But to some degree, it was a true thank-you, a sign that I appreciated their trust in letting me view a private corner of their world. You see, they managed to change my outward habits; but inside, I was still an Inuk. Inuit, traditionally, do not give true gifts, but only trade. So I wanted – needed – to give them a little piece of myself in return. I meant it.

Much later, when I learned that Mrs. Aech had passed away, the news left me with a sinking feeling, an emptiness, as though I'd forgotten how to breathe for a moment. It was a strange sadness, the feeling you get when a possibility has been irretrievably lost. It occurred to me, in that moment, that the mystery of who Mrs. Aech was would never really be solved. I was like a detective who had failed; who had built up a case over a lifetime, only to have all evidence burned away in a fire.

She has become a ghost that haunts me when I remember those halls, the red lipstick in that house, the silverware and artworks. Or when I clean up on Saturday, drying every last dish, being careful so as not to leave a single smear.

Pijariiqpunga. 

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