“I can bring home the bacon and fry it up in the pan. I am woman, hear me ROAR,” sings Helen Ready in a song. Before women learned to roar, they stayed home to take care of the kids and the house. When mothers felt the need for adult conversation, they invited the neighbors over for coffee and dessert. The dessert had to be homemade and fabulous.
This was showing off time as ladies sipped their coffee. If the praise was lukewarm and nobody asked for the recipe, the hostess was devastated. So some people lied to be polite and to make sure the hostess would praise their dessert.
Later the moms would make a little money by hosting Tupperware or Avon parties. The Tupperware people shot themselves in the foot by making a really good product. I still have pieces from 30 years ago. Today companies make things to not last long so you have to buy replacements and their profits keep increasing. What a business model!
I have been to many parties over the years, such as Pampered Chef, Christmas Around the World, candle parties, makeup parties, Discover Your Color and lingerie parties. Most were fun while others were torture. The makeup party really upset me. You have a beautiful face, the demonstrator informed me, but I was wearing the wrong shade of liquid makeup which I had purchased from the wrong company and I was applying it poorly. For only $150-$200 she could help me out. She spent a long time on my makeover while sighing deeply
As I looked in the mirror, I realized that I looked like a cross between a clown and a lady of the night. I did not buy her products. She hinted that I would be ugly for the rest of my life.
I next attended a party to find the colors that would bring out my eyes, my skin tone, and hair color. After draping me in different colored materials, she announced that I was a “fall” and my two best colors were “tomato soup red” and “Army green.” How many actresses have you seen wearing those colors on the red carpet? Try finding those colors in a store.
One of the last parties I attended was to sell lingerie. I was the oldest person there and had been married for many years. The product looked like it had come directly from “Frederick’s of Hollywood,” a sleazy store advertised in the back pages of magazines. This stuff would never last through one washing even though there was very little material in each piece. While everyone was giggling over edible panties and candy flavored bath paints, I sidled out of the room. They thought I was embarrassed! “What do you wear?” That was none of their business. Someone implied that I wore white cotton underpants. “Well that is not true, because some of them are other colors,” I hissed at them. I guessed that they did not know that cotton breathed and kept one cool. That was their loss.
Eventually people stopped asking me to attend their parties because I never bought anything. Maybe they should host Tupperware parties where nobody asked personal questions about the size and color of the guest’s underwear!
Recently I hosted a Valentine party and broke tradition. I bought treats from the bakery, and nobody complained. If you prefer to bake desserts, this one is worth the trouble.
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