Woke up to sunlight steaming in on me, which has never happened before. The way the camper is situated, the bedroom is on the west end of the camper, and I sleep on the north side of the bed. The most I’ve ever seen of the morning sun is a faint glow from behind the curtain. Turns out a window shade had been left up last night and the angle was just right for the sun to peek through the window at the far end of the camper. With the bathroom and bedroom doors both open, that shaft of sunlight had a direct path to my side of the bed, and it was saying, “Time to get up, girl!” Shortly after I got up and dressed, the sky clouded over. (The sun did show up again later in the morning).
There was a chill in the air when I got up and the heater had come on during the night. Not a weather change as manic as what’s happening in Michigan right now (in the 60’s yesterday, in the high teens today with snow, rain and wind…school cancelled), but still a change from the warmth of the last 4 or 5 days. When I checked the weather radar this morning, it showed a big green cloud developing and heading our way in the afternoon, so I decided to be grateful for that little sunbeam that disturbed my sleep this morning.
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While out on my walk today, I listened to an episode of History This Week, which was the story of the rise of Brownie Wise, the mastermind behind the Tupperware home party. It was a little about Earl Tupper, the founder of ‘the Wonder Bowl’ (Tupperware) and a lot about Brownie, the woman who figured out how to successfully market the product. Her success eventually led to her involvement in the Tupperware Company as Vice President of Home Parties. When she suggested taking it out of stores and selling it exclusively using the home party plan, sales rose and so did her fame. By some accounts, Earl Tupper was jealous when Brownie became more important than either him or the product she was supposed to be promoting. In 1958, after an event celebrating top sellers of Tupperware ended in near disaster, Brownie was fired from the multi-million-dollar company she had helped build; she didn’t have a formal contract or company stock; she was given a year’s salary as severance pay. An interesting side note for me was realizing that Tupperware was invented in the late 1940s. I had no idea it’s been around for well over 70 years.
I remember attending Tupperware parties as a young wife/mother. Learning that it was important to ‘burp’ the bowls and seeing all the fun products. Mostly what I remember is that reusing margarine bowls to store leftovers was far cheaper than Tupperware; but there were some products that I had to have: a Velveeta Cheese container, a Pick-a-Deli container (for relish or pickles), a pitcher with a fun lid, and bell Tumblers. All these products are still in use in my house to this day.
Trying to get five boys to sit around an oval dinner table without bickering proved to be a challenge for Jeff and me, especially when the far seat by the window was the most coveted…it was near the floor heating vent. Warmest seat at the table. We tried various methods over time including using a set seating arrangement according to age (no fair, because Tick always gets to sit by the window)…letting whoever set the table determine the seating arrangement (no fair, because he doesn’t like me so I got the crummy seat)…and having each kid pick a color of Tupperware cup, meaning that they had to sit wherever their color of cup was placed. (no fair, because I didn’t get to pick a color, I just have to have what’s left). Tupperware cups came in four colors, and we had five boys. Bought two sets of cups, the oldest four picked their color and Ezra picked whatever color he wanted that evening. Don’t remember what color Zac or Levi picked but Tick picked green, and Marshal ended up with yellow. And there came a time when we realized that total harmony at the dinner table just wasn’t going to happen with our crew.
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Sky got very dark and foreboding over in the Picacho Peak area about 1:30 on our way home from Eloy. The wind picked up, the air cooled down, the thunder boomers got louder, then the rain started at about 2:15 which was a little ahead of schedule. Thankfully we were snug in the camper when it started. It was coming from the southeast, so the noise was loudest right where we were sitting at the table. Big drops, which sounded like hail, were smacking right into the back of the camper. I could see it blowing sideways through the window behind Kim. Temperature cooled down in the low 50s as the storm reached us. A drop of over twenty degrees.
Kim kept an eye on his scope to make sure the wind didn’t knock it over. He realized that he could see it standing at the front of the camper, no need to go scurrying down there.
Rain dribbled off at about 4 o’clock, so we decided to go to Coolidge. What we hadn’t factored into that decision was that the storm was still on its way to Coolidge, so we were right back into it. Back at camp, the hummers were going crazy at the feeders. It was difficult to count because they were zooming around but I saw at least eight of them either sitting in the tree, hovering by a feeder, or sitting on a feeder. We thought maybe they were trying to make up for the nectar they’d missed out on during the downpour. We pulled into the yard and just sat in the truck, watching the fun.
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I’ve been working on felting a monkey for my menagerie for the past couple of days. The face I’d drawn to give me an idea of what I was working toward looked more like a bear…it was Kim that mentioned I had a real model sitting out on my bike. Why, yes, I do. Don’t know why I didn’t think of that. Moxie was more than happy to let me use her face as a reference. Looking at her, I realized I had the placement of the ears wrong on my drawing, which is why it looked more like bear.
Moxie wanted to name the monkey Jackson…I hope Charlie doesn’t mind.
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