New York Magazine – July 22, 2019

july 22–august 4, 2019 | new york 9

inside: Andrea Catsimatidis spreads the GOP gospel in NYC

several weeks ago, I saw a young woman on the subway
accidentally dump a full cup of iced coffee onto the seat next to her.
To the rescue came every single other female in the car— digging
into their bags, producing tissues and napkins, towels and wipes.
Meanwhile, the men, each and every one, edged away from the
scene and sat looking uncomfortably at their phones. Working
together, the women on the train turned the puddle of coffee into
a mountain of coffee-soaked paper, which the spiller took with her,
smiling, triumphant, when she disembarked at Wall Street.
The incident left me thinking about whose job it is to clean up
spills, the literal and also the metaphorical ones: the uncomfort-
able incidents that arise at work or at home. Why does it seem like
spill-cleaning is women’s work?
A recent study by psychologists in Colorado and Texas
showed that women are more prone to disgust and to display-
PHOTOGRAPH: PASCAL PRETI/GETTY IMAGES ing an aversion toward illness and lapses in hygiene than men

Things:

Lisa Miller

The Problem With

the Purse

Men know it’s better to

carry nothing.

Why don’t women?