How could a functional item, namely a drinking tumbler, cup, or mug, transform not simply into a woman’s fashion item, but into a fad? And so much so that many women have camped out at Target and other stores where the tumblers are sold, waiting for the store to open, so they could sprint to the aisle with Stanley tumblers, before they are sold out. Marketing savvy and social media influencers certainly helped fuel the fad, by creating the tumblers in a great variety of colors and by limiting the supply. But it couldn’t have become a fad, in the first place, unless there was something about these tumblers — something deeply symbolic — that resonated, with women, in a powerfully subconscious way. What could it be?
We might suspect that the cups represent an answer to a question that women have always had, and particularly so these days. Simply stated, the question is, “How to be a woman?” The answer is to be like a Stanley tumbler — on the outside tough, durable, and resilient, while simultaneously being pretty.
And on the inside? Obviously, water is poured into the inside of the tumbler. What, then, is the symbolic meaning of water? We know from mythology that it has multiple meanings. It can symbolize purity as well as transformation, as in the ritual of baptism. But in this case, it would appear that water is symbolic of the formlessness of feminine reality. That which is formless can become anything, by virtue of not possessing a particular form. We might recall, in that regard, that Tiamat, in ancient Mesopotamian mythology, was a sea goddess and a symbol of the primordial chaos. The sea is calm; she’s angry; she’s placid; she’s turbulent. Thus water is an infinite that can transform into anything. That is a feminine image of being.
Ah, but the water is given a form. It takes the form of the Stanley tumbler. Thus while form is intrinsic to masculine reality — and finds expression as identity, coherence, and lawfulness — form is extrinsic to feminine reality. Form merely contains the flowing feminine energies, as does a ring or a wristband, which also have a symbolic appeal for women. And while women, who embody the feminine, have a proclivity for emotional display, they are symbolically kept cool by virtue of the ice cubes placed in the insulated Stanley tumbler. Whoever thought that a water tumbler could be so pregnant with meaning?
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Copyright © 2018 Mark Dillof
