July 1999 mysterydate by Daniel Westreich |
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Tupperware and Machismo in Seattle
I woke up on Superbowl Sunday to a Seattle I barely recognized: the sun was
shining. Mindful of the fickleness of Pacific Northwest Weather (tm), I
hurried downstairs and made the call.
"Hey, is Andrea there?"
(pause)
[Sleepy] "Heylo?"
"Hey, Andrea, this is Daniel. Let's go throw some frisbee."
"Well, actually, I just woke up and I've got some stuff to do this morning,
yadda. But I'm going to this Tupperware party later -- you wanna come?"
"Uh. Sure." What did I just agree to?
"Cool, I'll come by around 3."
The phone finds its way back to the receiver. A Tupperware party? I go
walking anyway, and ten minutes later it is hailing.
The weather swings drastically at least three more times before Andrea picks
me up. We walk the six blocks to the party, chatting about the scamming
potential there. Andrea is a particular friend in this regard, as we both
in the market for Jewish women; the likelihood is that at least one of us
will have a chance with any given girl. The party is at the home of a
lesbian friend of Andrea's, however, and so the odds stack heavily in her
favor for this particular outing.
We arrive at a lovely, understated house, with a lovely porch set back from
the street behind a lush wall of green, and are greeted at the door by the
hostess, Angela, who graciously takes our coats. We enter the dining room,
where a lovely display of vegetables, dips, other guests, teas, and desserts
are assembled. We mill around the tastefully decorated living room,
murmuring politely to each other. I feel as if I were at a...Tupperware
party. And me without my knitting.
Andrea and I claim two seats on the big couch in the designated Tupperware
party room, where none other than our own Tupperware Lady is chatting with
another woman. I have not seen another man yet: I wonder if I will be the
designated Speaker for the Y Chromosome this afternoon.
I briefly consider trying not to meet the Tupperware Lady, then realize that
this is impossible, and dive in headlong: her name is Dawn and she's bright
and cheerful and friendly. Professionally so. I like her, though: she's
comforting, a comforting archetype. The way that, despite my best
male-feminist intentions, Donna Reed is a little comforting.
After fifteen more minutes of milling around, we gather in the living room,
and arrange ourselves in an oval, with the Tupperware at the top. There are
no other men in the room, and I'm beginning to feel self-conscious. We went
around the room, doing the youth-group introduction-and-relevant-fact thing.
Dawn first: she is a mother of two, and is just thrilled to pieces to be
here today.
Then comes the free stuff: first, Dawn passes around a grab bag of tiny
little Tupperware toys, from which I choose the luggage tag. Then begins
the Tupperbucks game, in which we earn Tupperbucks for various
accomplishments and questions answered; the mad Tupperbucks go to those who
will most propagandize Tupperware itself. At the end of the day, Dawn tells
us, we will be able to use our Tupperbucks in an auction for gift bags: the
capitalist in me is suddenly very involved in the day's proceedings. I earn
TB$100 for having walked to the party, and Andrea earns TB$200 for having
brought a guest. I also earn, in this first round, TB$500 because I am a
Tupperware virgin. There's no time like your first, apparently.
We start looking at the Tupperware itself. Dawn leads us through an
imagined house, stopping in each room to pitch the Tupperware that might
help organize it. The kitchen, of course, is our first stop. She talks
about her own kitchen, where she uses Tupperware to keep cereal and snack
foods fresh for months at a time, and to organize the otherwise cramped and
poorly designed space. "My kitchen was obviously designed by a MAN!" she
announces at one point. I laugh until I almost cry, and embarassed she
explains that she usually speaks to groups of all women.
We move on through the house, where there are myriad other uses for the
ubiquitous Tupperware. The tone of the guests is a little strained, but initially, we all seem to have just enough ironic distance on the
affair that we don't feel silly marveling, oohing and ahhing even, over the
latest, non burping Tupperware.
Dawn breaks us down. She is a marvel, however, of genuine, irony-free
enthusiasm over merchandise she has no doubt seen and praised upwards of
several hundred times. I start imagining the hundred different ways I could
organize my food closet with Tupperware, the cereals I could keep fresher,
the salad I could make in bulk and keep fresh all week:
"Andrea, this is really weird. Andrea?"
"Yeah... do you think I should buy these stackable spice containers?"
Dawn gives good theater, and knows her timing: two more rounds of
Tupperbucks punctuate the Tupperware demonstrations. The last round ends
with the two thousand Tupperbuck question: "Who wants to schedule a
Tupperware party for the future?" One woman is interested: she hauls in a
crazy TB$2000, and is way ahead of the bidding war for the mystery prizes.
Fortunately, she holds on to her Tupperbucks until next time, so
Andrea and I are free to bid fearlessly on the prizes. We illegally pool
our dough, and slap it all down on a mystery prize bag, which turns out to
contain a flat piece of freezer storage Tupperware, pink topped, appropriate
for storing flat, pink things.
Andrea orders her piece of Tupperware, and we retreat, raving about the
gorgeousness of one of the co-hosts all the way home. I walk into the
house, grab a beer, and nurse my masculinity in front of the third quarter
of the Superbowl.
Andrea never got a date with the co-host we thought was cute.
Dawn continues to show Tupperware in the Puget Sound area.
The Tupperware we won is currently storing bacon in my freezer.
in the junk drawer
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