Battle of the Bags

I have gone on the record here on more than one occasion and admitted freely that I have a bag problem. Until recently that meant I have a problem not buying a bag if I see one and like it. Yes. I have more bags than I should. One for every mood in every season. A dozen. Or more. And that’s after a cleaning frenzy and a Good Will drop.

Lately though my bag problem relates more to back problems.

During Tamara’s visit this summer I found myself beyond uncomfortable in pain as I stood waiting for her to take yet another (sorry, Tam) picture somewhere in Boston (every block, if I remember correctly)—weighed down with my heavy, albeit gorgeous, shoulder bag.

I knew the days of shoulder bags were over. They make me crooked and give me sciatica.

Which of course gave me a new excuse to buy bags. Woe is me.

So I tried short handled bags. And bags with both short handles and cross body straps. And they helped, but not always. Or not for long. Because I carry too much sh*t. Eventually, despite my initial efforts, I fill my bags to capacity. My iPad is heavy enough on its own; add notepads and things I really needn’t carry with my everywhere, and even a short handled bag gets uncomfortable to carry.

So I tried using a tote bag in which I’d throw in a wristlet or smaller bag so I could take that out and use it while shopping or out to eat, and leave everything else in the tote in the car, but I found those a little too small to fit even bare minimum items. Moreover, I found I started carrying more in the tote—even if it was just to the car, into school, back to the car, into the house.

In fact, putting said tote on my front passenger seat set off the seat belt alarm.

Not kidding.

No freakin’ wonder my back hurts.

And then I found it. A leather cross body bag—leather soft as buttah— that can fit my iPad (but doesn’t have to) and those things I have figured out I really do need to have with me, on my person. But it doesn’t weigh as much as a person, so my seat belt alarm stays quiet. And my back feels better.