i was in new york city recently, and i was on a mission to find myself a vintage purse. not just any ‘ole vintage purse. it needed to be big, so that i could carry lots of stuff in case i need to carry lots of stuff. the truth is, i don’t really carry too much in my purses, but i do like to have the extra room, just in case. i sought out the best vintage shops in the city. i dragged my man (hi k!) to several of them, and so patient he was with me whilst on my quest to find it. eventually — and after schlepping back and forth amongst the city, i found it…at a lovely store on the lower east side called edith machinist. a fendi bag from the early 80’s. perfect in size and exactly what i was looking for, with plenty of space to carry all of my little sundry items should i choose to. pristine, oversized — almost like a perfect little piece of luggage. after proudly making this this bag my primary one and transferring my goods into it, i got to (oh no…here she goes…) thinking about the things we each carry around with us. in our hearts, in our heads, in our lives. one of my all time favorite lyrics is from — guess! a bob dylan song from the bootlegged record, blood on the tapes. (if you aren’t familiar with blood on the tapes, you should be. outtakes from blood on the tracks. find it. get it. listen to it over and over and over until it is ingrained in you.) anyway, the line goes like this: i noticed at the ceremony that you left all your bags behind/the driver came in after you left/he gave them all to me and then he resigned. and so it is. in life, we carry our things, our own little bits of baggage and sometimes we are left holding things that belong to others. whether heavy in nature or light in weight, what we pick up and choose to carry around daily can weigh us down or at the very least, make us stop and realize that we need to lighten the load a bit. for now, my fendi is rather sparsely furnished. my wallet, a make-up bag, my iphone. i like to keep it light.
©littlebrownbutterfly