At the very minimum, or so I’ve heard, a purse must be able to hold a tube of lipstick, a credit card and a key. Most of the time, though, I expect a lot more from my purses. I like them to be able to carry my rather large wallet, a makeup bag and my iPod. I like them to double as a briefcase, holding notebooks, pens, a digital camera, business cards, perhaps a file or two and a whole bunch of crumpled papers.
At the moment, in addition to my wallet, cell phone, keys, makeup and iPod, my purse contains a sweatshirt, perhaps half a dozen Blowpops, Tylenol, nail clippers, a portable iPod charger, a portable CD player, fliers advertising concerts and art shows, three CDs and a bag of grapes.
It is not so much a purse as a survival kit.
And it has served me as such.
A small backpack and a giant purse recently saw me through a week in Italy, holding a travel guide, maps, bananas, bottled water and a scarf (in case it got chilly) in addition to the aforementioned wallet, makeup bag and iPod.
I have used my purse as a gym bag, as an overnight bag, as a pillow on an airplane.
I like a bag big enough to hold a winter coat.
I’m not sure where I got the idea that a purse should be almost large enough to double as a sleeping bag. Perhaps it came from my mother, whose purse at one point contained Band-Aids and paper towels and diapers and fruit snacks and a spare T-shirt and other things that come in handy when mothering four small children.
Perhaps it came from Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, for whom giant bags juxtaposed against tiny bodies have become a trademark and much-copied fashion statement.
Or perhaps I’m just drawn to large accessories — I favor large rings, large bracelets and large sunglasses, too.
Regardless of where my love of big bags came from, what I know is this: A few years back, when department stores began stocking their shelves with purses so large they were almost ridiculous, I bought one, followed by another and another.
A big purse, I realized, fit nicely with my pack-rat tendencies. It gave me a way to transport the free books I picked up from outside “A Novel Idea,” a fashionable way to carry thrift-store T- shirts purchased on the way to meet my sister for lunch on Saturdays.
I retired the first giant purse after just one season — I had made the mistake of buying an overly trendy one. I ruined the next one — a slouchy, burgundy leather bag from Urban Outfitters — at a rodeo last summer when a bottle of hairspray exploded inside. I replaced that one with a slightly larger suede hobo bag, which I phased out when I upgraded to the mother of enormous bags — a vintage piece of carry-on luggage purchased in January at a thrift store for 75 cents.
The luggage, powder blue with silver buckles, even holds running shoes with ease. And in crowded environments it provides a nice buffer between me and everyone else, like a force field.
I’ve discovered that accessorizing with a giant blue rectangle is also an easy way to jazz up an otherwise boring outfit.
I’m fearful, however, that this is too good to last.
It’s been a few years since big bags replaced the teeny, tiny, sparkly purses of a few years before. Something else is bound to come along soon.
So I am savoring this moment, one in which what is fashionable is also both practical and quirky.
I already have a medium-sized bag waiting in the wings for the moment when fashion says goodbye to big bags.
It is vintage and crocheted and able to hold my wallet, keys, makeup and cell phone, though little else.
But it has an enormous plastic handle and, for that, I love it.
