Every surface is cluttered with plates, cutlery and crumbs – and he wants to know what’s for dinner
to learn to be more tolerant,’ Colin reflects. ‘That’s just as well given I’m unlikely ever to return to the office full-time.’
But not everyone is able to resolve their ongoing battles. Many have complained to me that long-term working from home has exposed domestic inequality. What I find repeatedly is that women complain men are merely ‘helping out’ at home rather than truly sharing the load.
Men compare themselves to other men they know and feel they are doing more than average. But women compare what their husband does with what they themselves do and find them lacking.
There’s also the matter of standards. A man might think he’s cleaning dishes with aplomb only for his partner to disagree. But who sets the standards? If you expect hospital theatre levels of cleanliness in the kitchen, is it fair to expect tasks to be divided 50/50? Conversation is key.
Before the pandemic, Wendy Steer’s husband Ashley, who works for an American real estate and investment company, was either working from his city office or on trips to see clients around Europe. Ashley’s absences were part of family life for Wendy and the couple’s 16-year-old twins, a boy and a girl, giving her the space to run her own business from home.
Now, Ashley is two years into liaising with global clients from the family home. You might imagine that with a five-bed house, where Ashley works in a study downstairs and Wendy in her office upstairs, space wouldn’t be an issue.
But like Melanie, Wendy, 50, a wellbeing consultant who’s worked from home for four years, missed having the house to herself.
She says: ‘There’s no division of labour. Ashley doesn’t think to do any washing or ironing because I’m here to do it.
‘Yes he works longer hours and I’ve always managed my career around the kids — but I don’t like that the domestic load falls to me even now he’s around more.’
In contrast Ashley, 48, revels in working from home. ‘I love not having early starts or sitting around in airports or on planes and trains, which was all just dead time,’ he says.
‘During the first spring lockdown of 2020, even though I was extremely busy with work, there was more time than ever before to enjoy the weather and our garden with my family.’
Still, he has his own niggles too. ‘Wendy gets frustrated that I’m not on demand if she needs something doing in the house,’ he explains. ‘The point is that I’m at work and on calls all day. Mind you, I quite look forward to the days when she has meetings away from the house — so I do understand that she wishes she had the place to herself again.
‘I’m not sure Wendy will like this, but now that everyone’s so adept at virtual calls, I’ll probably always work from home.’
Frustrations aren’t confined to couples where both are working from home. Primary school teacher Esha Seth, 39, spends her days in the classroom but that doesn’t lessen her irritation that husband Vishal, 40, is still working from their four-bed detached home. They have a daughter of ten and a son, five.
Before the pandemic, Vishal’s career as an examiner for apprenticeship schemes meant he was out every day and often overnight too. ‘The house would be as immaculately tidy when I got home from work as when I left that morning,’ says Esha.
‘I used to squeeze in housework in the morning and after school, as I went along, to keep on top of everything. ‘Now Vishal does the afternoon school run and I arrive home to coats, shoes and schoolbags abandoned on the floor of our sizeable hallway.
‘All he wants to know is, “What’s for dinner?” when he’s the one who’s been at home all day.
‘Every surface in the kitchen is cluttered with plates, cutlery and crumbs where he’s made his lunch and snacks for the children, and don’t even get me started on the dining room.
‘When a year had passed and Vishal was still holding the table hostage, I was eager to know when he’d be going back on the road.’
Vishal says: ‘Esha doesn’t understand that when I get home with the kids, I have to work again straight away which means tidying up isn’t my priority.
‘I do love being a much more hands-on dad now, which I know Esha is secretly happy about, too. If only I wasn’t so messy.’
To which Esha responds: ‘I do understand there’s little point in Vishal incurring travel and hotel costs when his work can now all be done on a screen.
‘But it’s me — and my lovely dining table — paying the price.’
A heartfelt sentiment that is surely echoed in home-cumoffices up and down the country.