The Things I Carry

Years ago, I scrambled off to cover news stories with a couple of cheap plastic pens and those slim spiral pads still known as reporter’s notebooks. Maybe I carried a lighter. Certainly, a few books of matches. I had a wallet, too. Some cigarettes and change for pay phones.

Those were the things I carried.

I didn’t carry bottled water; I worked in San Francisco, not some Third World outpost. I didn’t carry coffee; I ate and drank in cafes where there were papers and conversation. I craved people and opinions and smiles from pretty girls, not espressos on the fly.

I didn’t need headphones connected to some micro-sound system to shut out the world. Somehow I lived without a Walkman or an MP3 player. I had to. They weren’t on anyone’s radar. Pocket-sized radios were for catching ballgames at the beach. They weren’t fashion statements. In city life, I didn’t carry one.

Later, with mounting contacts, I bought an address book. I loved it. It was, I recall, made of alligator or crocodile or some then-illicit hide. It was terribly expensive. It was neat and thin. So I carried it.

Still, I was traveling light. No penknife. No mini-flashlight. No money clip. A few keys, sure. It was a pre-laptop time. Pre-beeper, too. A reporter’s life was lived on the run. I liked the things I carried. There weren’t many. That’s mainly why I liked them.

Today, a few decades later, I carry much more. Blame it on work or parenthood or technology. Blame it on materialism. Blame it on a move to Los Angeles where, in some quarters, your accessories tell your story. But I carry much more than I used to. And I am getting weighed down, slowed by all that I carry.

Of course, I have a cellphone. Held out until pay phones started vanishing, and a stunning earthquake convinced me it might be a good idea. To get connected. To not be the lone, unreachable single parent in all of L.A. So I got one. And I carried it. Never much used it. But I carried it. Still do.

And now I have a brimming Filofax agenda-address book, my slender reptile-skin volume having cracked and crumbled. In truth, I’ve had this latest book for years. It is filled with hundreds of names and phones, even though I know by heart most of the numbers I require. Months of notes I can almost read, though I rarely forget engagements. Nevertheless, the book, wide as a club sandwich, goes with me most places. I carry it in a briefcase, another departure from my salad days.

You go from being a reporter with a spiral notebook and pen to being some Hollywood hybrid, and you get a briefcase. Not a leather envelope or backpack. Those are for models. For you, there are papers. There are scripts. There is more to have at hand. So a briefcase happens. More to remember. More to arrange. More to carry.

Today, inside that case--stylishly battered, worn rough from travel--are items I never imagined I’d possess or need, let alone carry. First off, there are things that keep me going. I have some arthritis now, and it pains me. There are pills for this, so I carry them. Every other year or so a doctor removes something from my body and declares it precancerous. Use sun block, he says. So I carry some of that.

The load gets heavier.

Then there are the electronics. There is a Palm Pilot. Forgive me, I am neither in charge of a government or large corporation, but I have a Palm Pilot. It was a gift. So I carry it. Someday--I can’t say when--it will take the place of my Filofax. That day will come only after I spend a few days telling the Palm Pilot what it needs to know. I eventually may find the time on some weekend or vacation.

Thankfully, it is not a large device. It is rather attractive. Borders on sleek. Looks good in the hand. You can, an ex-girlfriend says, place your whole life inside it: numbers, addresses, appointments, notes. Everything to get you through the week short of companionship, reassurance and affection. Not much to carry. Not much at all. Anyway, it’s in the briefcase.

The Palm Pilot, though, while popular, can only take you so far. And I have been promised a new wonder to carry. From my sister. For my birthday. It’s called a BlackBerry and it can send and receive e-mail through the air. You also can get game scores. The Palm Pilot may be retired without ever having been fully operational.

One less thing to carry.

Did I mention I have a daughter? She is, like everyone’s child, a mixture of, say, Albert Einstein and Marie Curie. And yes, she has her own things to carry--a knapsack filled with books and her own little telephone. However, each day I drive about the city with a number of her possessions at the ready, should she need them.

I carry her library and Social Security cards. In my car, I carry her umbrella and bicycle and boogie board. In my car’s trunk are her towels, blankets and chairs for impromptu outings at the beach. She likes them there. She always expects sunny days.

So at the Will Rogers or Westward or Zuma beaches, I sit on the sand, temporarily free of phones and agendas and pills, watching a brace of preteen girls play in the waves. I carry their gear over the sand, but none of my own. For myself, I carry only coffee, remembering so many cafes where, long before my daughter’s birth, I imagined how lovely she’d be. How I’d hold her.

How I’d carry her.