Stuff to carry

Sorry for the long hiatus in posts. As far as I know, Cíara is the only person still reading this blog, so it’s not as though I have a large audience to disappoint.

I am an overpacker. I always bring too much stuff with me when I travel, just in case I need an extra sweater, or another shirt, or a rain jacket, or socks or underwear: who knows when I’ll next get to do laundry? Who knows what situation I may need to dress for? I need this sweater and that sweatshirt, just in case I need to present myself in different degrees of formality; I need these cotton and those woolen socks, just in case the weather turns; I need two jackets, one for rain and one for shine. And I haven’t even started on the chargers (UK and EU), and writing utensils (pen, pencils, pencil sharpener, eraser), and musical instruments (well, just the practice chanter), and notebooks (this one’s a journal, that one’s for ideas), and miscellaneos junk (who knows when I might need lacrosse balls to roll out my back, and it seems prudent to carry a couple extra masks, and what about all these printed COVID tests and plane tickets and passenger locator forms?) that I carry along.

When I get to the ho(s)tel or home or place I’m staying, I open my bag and all of this stuff explodes out from its confinement. Instantly, every available surface is covered: sweaters, shirts, and pants hang over chairs or the foot of the bed and cover the floor; on the night stand crowd coins, slips of paper (receipts, tickets, bills of money), my watch, mobile, glasses cleaning spray and wipes, masks (used and new), and a million tiny things that surge out of my pockets at the end of the day. In the hostel, I immediately declare my presence simply by spreading my stuff everywhere: where I am, there too spreads a cloud of co-travelling bits of this and that.

But it’s about territory: I am a stranger in a strange new land, passing through a beautiful, voluntary exile. I am priviledged precisely to have these things with me: most people dislocated in space don’t have the luxury of carrying their posessions with them. I carry not just myself, but material and personal reminders of who I am and where I came from. As I carry things with me from here to there, this sweater or lighter or pencil is not just a lighter or sweater or pencil, but the pencil/sweater/lighter that I brought with me; when I put it down on public display in whatever room I find myself in, I declare: “here I am, and not just me, but a whole entourage of things.” By coating the room with my meaningless stuff, the place becomes for me a temporary home.