people and their bags

I have been on a few planes over the past week, and I am struck over and over by people’s relationships to their bags.

The fees imposed in the US for checked bags have clearly shifted people towards carrying on more, so people no longer just carry a bag to entertain themselves or work on the plane. They carry everything they possibly can. Shopping for bags shows this off even more: the 22 inch wheeled upright is touted all over as maximum legal carryon like it’s some kind of performance-enhancing drug. People can buy bags to put in their bags to help them pack more (this seems odd – surely the bag in the bag means you fit less, as you’ve got all that extra bag now?). The goal, I believe, is to carry as much with you as possible, which feels like a burden and as though you’ve gotten some special bargain by saving the $15 an airline would charge you. Travel by taking as much of home with you as possible.

So we jostle around on planes and airports feeling shackled to these bags. Don’t leave the bag. Find space for the bag. Get the bag. Stow the bag. Get the bag. Stow the bag. Don’t lose the bag. Don’t take your eyes off the bag. It makes our stuff so overwhelming.

You know what? I think $15 is a reasonable charge to not have to carry another one of those wheeled bags all over airports. I’ll give them another $5 to get it straight to whereever I’m staying.

Better yet, I’ll just take less. That’s what I’m doing this week: headed to Chicago till Friday with a lightweight duffel and a laptop bag. It’s no doubt still more stuff than I need, but I decided to err, for this work trip, on the side of having some dress shoes.

It’s a nice feeling, having a bag that just carries stuff (and which I can easily maneuver on the subway) and makes few demands on me.