The Terror of the Woman's Handbag

As some of you may have noticed, I'm a girl.  Among other things, this means that I own and even occasionally carry a purse.  Now, I have some shoulder issues, so my purse is relatively small, and always has been.  I also try to not to pack too much in it for the same reason.  But no matter how little is in it, and no matter how small it is, it apparently still contains a small black hole like every other handbag.

It's amazing what you can fit in one of those things.

Now, I know some of my readers are men, so allow me to elaborate.  Some of you may have delved into a woman's purse before, and will be familiar with this.  Others (like my husband) may view the purse as sacred female territory that should never be entered by a male.  For those who aren't, there is apparently some sort of law that states whatever you're looking for must be at the very bottom of the bag (unless you look there first).  This is true, regardless of how many pockets a purse has.  You could literally have a specially shaped pocket for each item in your purse, and your keys would still be underneath everything and hidden around three corners.  Your purse could be the size of your keys, and you would still be unable to find them in it. 

Or the size of about four Pinkie Pies, like mine.

 

Because of this annoying but inevitable fact, I usually wear pants and put the important stuff in my pockets.  However, I occasionally wear a skirt or dress--these are clothing articles that rarely contain pockets, and are invariably hideous when they do.  On these occasions, I have no choice but to put everything I usually put in my pockets in my purse.  These items include: keys, wallet, phone, pocket knife, and chapstick.  Now, the purse rarely has room for this and it's normal contents, so I have to remove some of the less essential items from it in order to make room.

Here we come to today's story.  I had just such an occasion this weekend.  I pulled out a small notebook, kleenex, lotion, and an empty bottle of painkillers and stuffed in my wallet, keys, and pocket knife.  I went about my business for the day, and when I returned home, fished the stuff that normally went in my pockets out of my purse.

Or at least I tried to.  My keys never actually went in my purse (I clipped them to the strap), and my wallet's kind of hard to lose.  My little tiny pocket knife, on the other hand, had completely vanished.  I could have sworn I tucked it in the secret zippered pouch inside my purse (every decent purse has one of these), but I couldn't find it.  I dumped half the contents of the darn thing out, and still couldn't find it.  I decided maybe I hadn't put it in my purse and it had slipped out of my pocket and fallen between the couch cushions.  It's happened before.  I once lost that thing in our recliner for months.  Unfortunately, only crumbs lay between the cushions.  So, I sadly shrugged and concluded that I had lost it.

That was Saturday.

Today I decided to give it another go, and fully emptied my purse.  It contained:

• four pens (three of which had a Hello Kitty character on them)
• one Sharpie
• a measuring tape
• my favorite lipstick
• a pack of gum
• fugu mints
• blueberry flavored lip balm in an owl shaped container
• a comb
• a Chococat shaped mirror compact
• a pony tail holder
• change
• a receipt for my last visit to the dentist

I was baffled.  Where had my knife gone?  And so I delved further, into the secret pocket.  Keep in mind, I had thoroughly rummaged through here before with no success.  It contained:

• two maxi pads (that's what the secret pocket is for)
• two mysterious stickers with a bar code, number, and the word password printed on them
• a receipt for a pair of earrings I bought off an artist friend
• three seashells

Here I just want to pause and say, seashells.  Now that I recall, a friend brought them back from a beach trip for me some time ago. 

"He doesn't know how to use the three seashells!"

And then I found my pocket knife.  It was in there the whole time.

Goodnight, kids!