She pointedly waited for him to open the door, and slid in sideways, lady-like (not head first with butt in his face). “The Jack Tar,” she told the driver. “What happened to your tie?” she asked in the intimate backseat.
“This is the new style. Don’t you talk to the buyers? The short tie is going to hit the City by next week. You watch. The man in a grey flannel suit will be wearing this castration tie.” A man of mode talking here. “If I were wearing a velvet tie, would you stroke it?”
“Of course I wouldn’t. Why would I do that?”
“Because a womanly hand naturally likes to finger nappy velvety furry fuzzy wuzzy nap pile. I could take advantage of your instincts. But I won’t. I make it a policy to tell women exactly what I’m up to from the get-go, and I expect women to be up front too. Nobody ambush anybody’s instincts. Put your cards right out there on the conscious level. Don’t take advantage. If you want to stroke my tie and work your way up and down to the rest of the bod, you have to tell me that that’s what your intentions are, and not pretend you’re interested in retailing that type of tie. Years from now, when our affair is over, or we’re getting a divorce, I don’t want you to say you were just interested in my necktie, and one thing led to another, and it was all my fault.”
“What are you talking about?” she said.
“I am practicing on you my technique of honesty with women. Alas, women I’ve tried it on decide not to see me again.”
“You’ve got motor oil or something on you. And your hand is bleeding.” The girl of my dreams does not say that line distastefully, Louise.
“This is a workingman’s hand, and this on my tie is the grease of hard labor.”
She didn’t answer. Neither said anything for slow blocks. Wittman smoked out the window.
“What are you doing this weekend?” she asked.
“I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it.” The trouble with people in the workaday world is that they live for the weekends. Don’t live for the weekends.
“The U.S.S. Coral Sea is coming in on Sunday. I know a couple of guys on it. I’m bringing my girlfriends to meet them. It’s going to be a really nice weekend.” Why’s she telling him this? Isn’t it bad manners to discuss a party that somebody’s not invited to? Oh, he gets it. She’s being friendly, talking about her social life with a business colleague.
So, the Navy is sailing home to San Francisco, and Louise and the wahines will be at Naval Air Station Alameda to greet them. You can count on women to have a life outside of the office. Others with outside lives: people who speak another language, criminals, people who dress differently from mannequins. Louise is not the kind of girl he’s used to. The ones at school would have met ships to convert the sailors from war.
Central Casting put this influential girl beside him on this backseat taxi ride, and his next line should be: “Are you going to make the sailors go AWOL to keep them from sailing on Sasebo and Kobe and Subic and Pearl Harbor and the Gulf of Tonkin and setting up strategic hamlets and imperializing other countries?” Be a responsible citizen. “Fuck the war out of them, Louise,” he said.
“What did you say? Hey, don’t talk dirty. I just date them. That’s all.”
“As long as nice girls like you think that men look cute in uniforms, they’re going to keep warring and killing.”
“Men do look cute in uniforms. You’d look cute in a uniform. The ones with the best uniforms are the Marines.”
What’s the use, huh? Babytalk. They were on Van Ness Avenue, passing the showrooms of new cars. She pointed out the one so-and-so owned and the one she wanted once she got promoted to buyer. “Buyers go on buying trips to New York and Europe.” They passed the Board of Education building. If she were smarter, he’d entertain her by telling about the City’s multiple-choice test for teacher applicants. They arrived at the Jack Tar Hotel, which people were still making fun of because of its plastic red, blue, and yellow panels (the same colors as the pipes outside of walls at the new architecture building at Cal), forever modern and ugly. The searchlight that was sweeping the sky was shooting from the Jack Tar, not from a car show. The fog or clouds caught in the big beam roiled and boiled; it seemed to be raining up there. Louise paid for the taxi. She and Wittman became part of the crowd beaconed here.
“Hi. Hello. Hi, there,” Louise said left and right, stirred up by a crowd. Party time. They followed the arrows to one of the convention rooms, where there was a sign-in table at the door. His name wasn’t on the rolls; he wasn’t a Management Trainee anymore and should be back minding the store. But as long as he was here, he might as well stay. Gee, thanks. You’re welcome too. Too bad he didn’t rate a name tag, stick it on his tie to make it longer, or tape up the cut on his hand. “One good thing, you’re tall,” Louise said. What did she mean by that? So he could see above the crowd? So she could have a tall escort? His height made up for his color? A salesman howdy-doodied her, and she peeled away from his tall side.
There was a food table with a drizzly grizzly bear made out of plastic ice, the California bear, re-usable for every occasion. Wittman loaded a tiny plate with coldcuts, deviled eggs, battered deep-fried shrimp, carrot sticks, and sheet cake. As soon as the Mexican-looking lady in the maid outfit put the shrimp down, people glommed on it, very aggressive and rude over food. Wittman ate in a corner, near an ashtray. A Pilipina-looking lady asked him what he wanted to drink. “A martini,” he said. She wrote that down without asking for money. So, this was not no-host. Good.
There was no other of his ethnic kind here. Counting the house every time. Can’t help it. Made racist by other people’s trips. Politics and war—other people’s bad trips that spoil the ad-hoc scene. What’s wrong with him that he keeps ending up in Caucasian places? Like the English Department. Like Management Training. Like the Actor’s Workshop audience. He didn’t have a thing for bok guai. And he wasn’t, as far as he knew, blackballed by Chinese. So where were the brothers? Where was fraternité? Wherever I go, I do the integrating. My very presence integrates the place.
The serving lady came back with a martini for him, and he didn’t have any place to set down his paper plate and the glass and the cigarette in his mouth. So he slid down the wall to the floor, and made of the floor both chair and table.
Over a roomful of people, there spreads an invisible blanket that covers everybody. Wittman was drawing it to himself, bunching it, stuffing it into a hole in his corner (that leads to the fourth dimension). He shot back stink-eye for stink-eye. He felt satisfaction at having found an answer for how to sit wherever, and from now on he can use it in many situations, in line at the movies, for example, in line for a restaurant table, a teller’s window, an airplane, and, if the world got very bad, in an Army line, in a bread line. And when he gets to the Tuileries, where you have to pay to sit on a folding chair, he’ll have a seat ready. Yes, the earth means to be benevolent, after all, and always provides a place for the weary to sit down.
Then—here they come—“orientals,” all in a group. A guy and three chicks, one in a cheongsahm. He was against girls who wear cheongsahm. This oriental group were busily talking to one another; they didn’t have trouble finding their coterie. The guy, embarrassingly short, twinkling away in his cute suit, reached up and clapped a white guy on the back, gave him the old glad hand, got patted on the back in return. Then he was introducing the chicks, every one of them pretty. Suddenly, as if a volume knob had been turned up, the oriental was no longer saying “rhubarb rhubarb rhubarb.” Bouncing about on his toes out of exuberance and shortness, he distinctly said, “Wanta get your ashes overhauled, huh?” Overhauled? He had a Hong Kong San Francisco accent. Too bad he wasn’t Japanese. Nobody laughed, so he said it again, a broader delivery, a thumb at the girls, who didn’t seem to notice, or pretended they didn’t. He was telling a sex joke—American guys tell sex jokes—man to man—but if it didn’t go over, it could be taken as a cigarette joke, everybody standing around with long ashes. Or a car joke. Hedging
his bets, the coward. If Wittman were not already on the floor, he would have slunk down now.
One of the girls—not the one in Miss Chinatown Narcissus Queen drag—turned around—her spike heels stabbed and drilled the carpet—walked over to Wittman in the corner, and said, “Get up, and quit making a fool of yourself.”
“What business is it of yours?” he answered in Chinese. She went right back to her friends. She probably hadn’t heard how snappy his comeback was; she probably didn’t even know the most common Chinese sayings, such as, “What’s it to you?” He stood up. He’ll get her. “Slowly I turn, step by step, inch by inch, closer and closer.” The clique left for the next part of the program.
Everybody moved into a room with a platform. A banner read, IT’S MATTEL—IT’S SWELL. Wittman took a seat by the door. An executive at the microphone welcomed “the community of retailers” to the “premiere” of new toys. “But first,” he said, “let me show you the stats.” A chick in net stockings held up a poster. It had a pie chart on it. “Entertainment dollar,” said the man. “Family fun.” In Wittman’s entire life, whenever anybody—econ professor, insurance salesman, t.v. newscaster—threw one of these percentage pies at him, his mind died. For the hell of it—he had little enough to do—he paid attention, but the next thing he knew, he was aware of not having listened for some time.
The orientals—all right, the Chinese-Americans—were sitting together near the front. They’ve set up the section where we’re all supposed to come sit, which they’d done to the school cafeteria of every school he ever went to. At Cal, they had their own rooting section within the rooting section. Watch. One by one they’re going to turn around and sneak a peek at him. See? One of the girls—a dec-art major, or a child-development major—put her elbow up on the back of her chair, profiled the room. He and she gave each other the old once-over. They both looked away; why should they greet each other? (Because your parents and grandparents would have run up yelling to one another and shouted genealogies of relatives and friends and hometowns until they connected up.) I am not going to the prom with the only Chinese girl in the class. I am not going to be the one to room with the foreign-exchange student.
The guy had a shaved neck; the girls had sheets of black hair, one bob and two pageboys. Their hair was so shiny that you could see why you call the crown of the head the crown. Buddhaheads. Is it really true that Caucasians have more of a variety of looks than other people? Grant that almost all Black people and russet people have brown eyes. Do they say they can’t tell us apart because we all have brown eyes and we all have black hair? Whereas they have red hair and strawberry blonde and dishwater blonde and platinum and wisps-of-tow and auburn, and brown, and black. And they also have curly and wavy as well as straight. Ash blonde. Honey blonde. Taffy. Hey, wait just a minute. Hold everything. Are there all those kinds of blondes or are there lots of words? There are lots of words and all those blondes. Because of the words, and vice versa. People look at blondes with discernment. When you think about it, aren’t blondes sort of washed out? Pale? But there’s an interest in them. Everybody looks at them a lot. And sees distinctions, and names the shades. Those four heads were each a different black. Kettle black. Cannonball black. Bowling-ball black. Licorice. Licorice curls. Patent-leather black. Leotard black. Black sapphire. Black opal. And since when have ashes been blonde? Ashes are black and white. Ash black. And his own hair. What color was his own hair? He pulled a mess of it forward. It’s brown. But he always put “black” on his i.d.s. I’ve got brown hair. And never knew it though combing it at the mirror daily because when you think of Chinese, Chinese have black hair. This hair is brownish, and two of the heads of hair in front are brownish too. He felt the dearness of those four people. Keep an eye out from now on. There are probably more of us with brown hair than black hair. Easy to think up words for browns. Chestnut, and more. We’ll make up many, many names for dark.
“Let me have a little fun with you,” said the emcee, who was telling business jokes. At least he didn’t tell race jokes. A lot of people warm up meetings with race and sex jokes. “Seriously, folks,” he said. “The concept of toys,” he said. “Fun.” “Play.” “Core departments.” “Meet the needs of the key customer audiences.” (Where did my toys go? I’ve stopped having toys.)
Helpers ran up and down the aisles handing out “literature”—more pies, pictures and descriptions of toys, their stock numbers, order forms, handouts, inserts. As the executives talked—the people who introduced them were very honored by their presence—they had long titles, Western Regional this and that—you were to follow along marking up a page, then insert it among other pages. The pages were numbered like 19.B.2.a. Very scientific. Pagination. You could add to this binder forever at any point. Lots to do. Wittman hated this perversion of the classroom and books and the decimal system. All four of the other Chinese-Americans were taking information down in their notebooks like this was a difficult college lecture. “And that’s true too,” they wrote, which is a line in King Lear. Wittman had written a paper on how an actor playing Gloucester must have written it in the margin of his script.
With the nice sharp pencil they’d given out for free, Wittman drew a grid, a copy of his time sheet, and marked the days he’d cut out from work. The regular workers accumulated one day of sick leave per month. He had used up his accrued days. Now that he’d been demoted, was he accruing a half-day per month? It seemed that he was six days overdrawn. When would be a good day to cut out again? You don’t want a conspicuous pattern of absences. It was time to call in sick on a Tuesday again. An absence is more enjoyable when you can anticipate it for days in advance. Taking a long weekend is suspect, of course. Taking off on Wednesdays is good—breaks the back of the week. But he didn’t work Wednesdays anymore.
Is it time yet to speak up and give this meeting some life? Well, to tell the truth, the reason he was no longer in Management Training was that he had treated it like school. It wasn’t a school? He had raised his hand, and contributed to discussion, “Do you give any goods, furniture, clothes, candy to the poor?” And he had tried to inform and give perspective—“During World War II, this store gave dolls and toy cars to the ‘relocated’ children. But every girl got the same make of unsold doll, and every boy the same car. Kids don’t like to get the same toy as the next kid. Kids walked away from the Camp Santa when they saw what they were going to get. It doesn’t do any good to gift-wrap either unless there’s a surprise inside. I move, the next war we send a variety of individualized toys. This isn’t a voting meeting? What do you mean this isn’t a voting meeting? I think every meeting in a democracy should be a democratic meeting. Robert’s Rules of Order at least.” No, of course he wasn’t being facetious. He wasn’t asking for pie in the sky; he knew this wasn’t the place for legislating that there be no more “Relocation” Camps and no more war, but they could pass resolutions. He most certainly had stuck to the subject at hand. “Doesn’t anyone want to second my motion?” There had been others who got carried away; they too thought that meetings are places where one makes motions and seconds them and votes on them. See? He wasn’t crazy. “I move that we operate on a profit-sharing plan.” “Let’s run this store on co-op principles.” “I move that we reserve one table in the Garden Lanai for feeding the poor.” “Does selling candy to children contribute to their good?” “I move that the Sports Department stop selling guns and ammo.” He’d even won a few victories—against selling books out of vending machines, and against blisterpacking books to protect them from spit-on-fingers browsing. Yeah, it scared him to speak up, but what actor doesn’t have stagefright? An actor dead of smugness, that’s who. Well, he didn’t pass Management Training. A supervisor wrote him up as “disruptive at meetings,” and gave him some new hours. There wasn’t a scene or anything. Nobody said that part-time was a demotion. He liked shorter hours. Make stockboy soon. (The Monkey King had not minded cleaning stables until somebody told him that his title, Shit Shoveler to Avo
id Horse Plague, was bottom in rank.)
Three chicks and three men with straw hats, red-and-white blazers, and candy-cane canes, men in blue pants, girls in nets, hoofed out. They led a cheer, “YOU CAN TELL—IT’S MATTEL—IT’S SWELL.” “All together, boys and girls,” they said. “Hit it.” Taped music started up. They banged tambourines and shook sleighbells. They sang that Christmas song that rhymes “boy and” and “toyland.” The Chinese-Americans in front, and Louise in front too, were having a good old time, singing along, shrugging shoulders to the beat.
The lights went out. Whistling. Clapping. “The new Mattel line!” A curtain opened—a movie screen. Green hills and blue sky, and the noise of engines. And around a turn in the road—a long shot of the road—thunders a motorcycle gang. Like The Wild One, like Marlon Brando riding into Hollister. The gang comes into view—right up to the camera—they are little boys in Nazi leather jackets and boots. Words splay across the sky—VA-ROOM! VA-ROOM! It was just an ad for plastic tricycles with outsize wheels that made a lot of noise. The cameras settled at a normal angle, and we see the suburban street we normally live on. Not the road into Hollister. The gang leader, the cutest little Nazi, says into the camera, “Va-room by Mattel. You can tell it’s Mattel. It’s swell.” VA-ROOM! VA-ROOM! The end. Applause. Lights. The emcee announced how many times per day this commercial was going to run on network t.v. between now and the last shopping day before Christmas. Blitz the Saturday-morning shows for kiddos. “Demographics.” “The entire country.” “Going national on all three networks.” “Across America.” “Major.” More applause. Go to U.C.L.A. film school and make industrial films.
The fishnet girls came back through a side door—costume changes accomplished during the screening—ta da! Barbie and Barbie’s best girlfriend, Skipper, and Barbie’s best Black girlfriend, Christie, did a skit about waiting for Ken to show up for a date, then he does show up. Ken and Barbie, informal, danced to Barbie’s theme music. Ice-skating Skipper. Nurse Christie. Barbie-Q with her potholder and other accessories. Ken and Barbie après ski. The audience whistled and stomped for Malibu Barbie, Malibu Christie, Malibu Skipper, Malibu Ken in bathing suits and sunglasses. And the grand finale—Barbie Bride. And Bridegroom Ken and Bridesmaid Skipper. Everybody sang out together like community sing: “You can tell it’s Mattel. It’s swell.” Oh, god, I don’t belong on this planet. Then it was over, and time to leave the Jack Tar.