Why I’ve given up on handbags

I have given up handbags. Men may think this a trifling thing. Women will understand it was not a painless decision. In my adult life I had rarely left home without a bag. Sometimes just a small clutch bag, but more likely a bucket bag which hung, with the weight of a Yorkshire terrier, from my shoulder. I have a dent in my collarbone to prove it. Then came Covid.

You may remember that obsessive hand-washing was the first thing asked of us. It preceded social distancing, mandatory masks and the proscription of everything that makes life enjoyable, and though I’m not a herd animal I did give some thought to my normally relaxed attitude to germs. For one thing, I use public transport a lot.

Wherever I went, my bag went with me. It sat on bus seats, stood on train carriage floors, rode on airport security conveyor belts. I began to see it through a different optic. No longer a boon companion, filled with essential items. More an adventure playground for death-dealing bugs. Dispensing with it might reduce my infection footprint. But could I possibly live without it?

What is it with women and bags? Men have their man bags and laptop cases, but they can lay them aside without twitching. See them go, walking down the street, whistling, hands free. Enviable.

For many women, the bag imperative kicks in with motherhood. Human infants now travel with vast amounts of stuff. The woman who used to cycle to work carrying nothing more than a cross-body pouch becomes, overnight, a beast of burden, ramming into a Cath Kidston tote everything her child might possibly need between its first breath and freshers’ week. The dial is set. She is for evermore wedded to a bag loaded with things that might come in handy.