Modern Day Bag Ladies

When I was publishing NEWletter I started a column which was WRWL standing for Where Real Women Live. I asked for people to comment on the column but a few literalists thought it was a real radio show. Fast forward Blogging. Now is your chance to respond to my first article in this series, Modern Day Bag Ladies, which again isn't literal and with the economy now, we definitely pray not to become, but here goes.




"This is where Real Women and Real lives are talked about; we will voice this on WRWL Talk Radio Where Real Women Live. None of this Martha Stewart, PTA and church-volunteer-of-the-year stuff. No, this is where the worn-out tires of our lives hit the roads we are forced to drive on as we navigate our ways through career, marriage, and carpool in our attempts to appease our cultural dictates. This will be a listening post just like a call-in radio station where everyday women - not just celebrities or those who have “arrived”- share how they survive the everyday crazy lives that we are “supposed” to live. Women are encouraged to comment on their own view on a topic or article written and to share their wisdom on living an authentic life."


So in our first airing of WRWL we are calling all:

Modern day Bag Ladies!No I’m not talking about the poor women on the streets whom we pity or even secretly dread becoming someday, but of the everyday woman who cannot leave her house without packing at least one bag for herself and others before they leave home to start the day. Now, let’s see - this could include packing your husband’s lunch in his briefcase, packing a diaper bag for an infant, packing lunches and backpacks for your other children - and yet we forgot packing our own bag.

You see I myself the other morning took the term self-nurture to heart and packed in my bag a complete lunch, reading material, and even a breakfast to eat during break (since I fail at taking the time to sit down and eat mine with or before the kids eat theirs). Then I packed the backpack for my 3-yr.-old with pull-ups, lunch, snack, tippie cup and a blanket. Then I packed my 4th grader’s lunch putting it in his wheeled backpack, verifying that his homework, permission slips, music book were all there, and oh yes - it was Monday so we had to take the violin for music.

Now some of you saints have more children to pack for, along with a sports bag or two. (Oh, for the days before children when I, too, packed a sports bag for my own workout! Now getting the kids off to school and me on time for work constitute my daily workout.)

But do you see? Do you add it up? All these bags of things – forget room for passengers - we drive minivans to hold all the bags! We are modern day bag ladies and if by chance alas, one bag does not appear at its destination, guess who is the responsible one destined to go back for it? You got it – the bag woman. I’ve even heard of some women who go beyond bags, carrying boxes. And where, pray tell, do we put our purse?

One day I had purposefully packed my bag first, with the complete breakfast and lunch in it, yet that bag never saw the light of my car. My 3-yr.-old insisted on being loaded first and in the midst of going back 3 times for a different juice filled tippie cup I got on the road, kids strapped in, only to discover at my child’s daycare that my bag was missing. I was driving without a license and didn’t have my wallet to buy anything to eat at break. I knew I wouldn’t have a chance until lunch to go home and get it. So I got to work rattled and hungry, like a chunk of me was gone. Ever since then, my son reminds me, “Did you pack your bag Mom?”

How many bags do you pack in your life? Have you found any ways to simplify it? How are you letting others take more responsibility for the bags in their lives? Any suggestions on surviving the shuffling of the bags each morning?



MJ. Buist



©Buist 2002