Yesterday morning on CNN, there was a story about a woman who collected new or gently used purses to give to women in poverty. While I am not knocking her efforts in the least, something she said in the story really caught my attention:
“A woman carries her life in her purse, it's her home away from home.” Tara Brettholtz of Clifton Park said.
Now, I am probably one of 10 women in this world who doesn't carry a purse (nor will I ever), so I, admittedly, don't get the concept of why anyone would want to carry her entire life in a bag attached to her body by a strap of fabric or a thin piece of leather. It goes along with that whole group trip to the bathroom thing...if I am making a trip to the restroom, it is to accomplish a certain task, not to catch up on the latest gossip. I want to get in, get done, and get out.
I have been teased by my women friends about my adamant refusal to carry one, only to hear them bitch in the next breath about getting stuck behind the little old lady in the Walmart check out line who insists on digging two cents out of the bottom of her purse, so she doesn't have to get $.98 in change, which will end up in the bottom of that very same bottomless purse. (I, too, have been witness to this phenomenon; it is amazing just how many used kleenex and half sticks of gum can emerge from one of those things.)
They also tell me that they have to carry one because they need to carry so many things for their families, and their husbands insist they have this and that in case they need it. First of all, I do not walk on four legs, nor do I bray for my dinner, and I am not going to haul around 20 pounds of shit simply because I "might" need it. I manage to carry all the essentials - driver's license, insurance cards and credit card - in a wallet that fits neatly in one pocket; and that has been my creed for the last 38 years...if it doesn't fit in a pocket, I don't need it. Besides, I tell them, his hands aren't broken, and if he thinks he "might" need it, let him pack it. Seriously...if purses are such a great creation, then why don't all men carry one?
I have to admit, though, women and their purses are an endless source of entertainment to me. Just watch them in the grocery store; they either clutch them to their bodies like a small child (which, in retrospect, could be the issue, since many of them are big enough to encase a small child), or they heave them into their shopping carts like Atlas unloading the earth from his shoulders. I mean, what on earth could they possibly have in those things to make them weigh that much? Oh, yeah...used kleenex and half sticks of gum.
The other part of this story that caught me was when I heard that purses empower women by giving them financial independence. Really??!!! How??!!! Half of the women I know have to swim through their purses' black holes just to find their checkbooks. And how is it really empowering when everything in your life sits in a bag that some doucheball is just waiting to rip off your shoulder or grab from your shopping cart? I don't find that empowering at all; in fact, I see it as just the opposite. I don't know how many times I have seen women walking through a parking lot, digging through their purses, looking for their keys, completely oblivious to what is going on around them. As far as I am concerned, they may as well just paint a bullseye on their backs. Personally, if someone is going to come after me, I want two free hands to knock the fucker on his ass, not just one.
Several years ago, we had a spate of purse snatchings in our area, and they all happened the same way: A woman left her purse in the child seat of the shopping cart, turned around to put her groceries in the car, turned back around to grab her purse, only to find it had already been grabbed. Every woman said the same thing: 'I feel so victimized!" While I truly felt bad for these women, I still had to wonder why anyone would leave something so valuable sitting in a shopping cart in the first place. It didn't make sense to me, and it still doesn't.
Furthermore, when I hear "power" or "empowerment" related to an inanimate object, such as a purse, or a Bible, or anything along that line (weapons are different stories, and all I'll say is if you are carrying one, know how to fucking use it, so it isn't taken from you and used against you), it leaves me asking why we have to project power onto something that really isn't going to to do a damn thing for us? These things are just things; they have no feelings, they aren't going to defend us or comfort us or boost our self confidence; no...these are things we have to develop within ourselves. We have to be our own source of power, and our own source of empowerment. And while I agree 100% that women and girls need to learn financial independence, money management, and, above all, self confidence and self worth, giving them purses, even ones with designer labels and attitude, is not the way to do it. Honestly, I would rather spend $30 a month on a good self defense course than lose that same $30 in the form of loose change somewhere in a 20 pound bottomless pit.
I am going through this battle with my oldest; she wants to carry one. I told her fine, but only if I could sign her up for a martial arts class, and then when she gets older, I get to teach her how to shoot a gun. So far, no martial arts class, and no purse.
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