I have a substack! And it probably is not hard to tell that I have no idea what I am doing there. Despite feeling like a very new kid at a cool, yet lesser known school, I've enjoyed trying something new and connecting with other writers I had not heard of otherwise. The blog will still be my main landing page, and I'm not quite sure how substack and the blog will relate to each other, if much at all. In the mean time, I wanted to share my most recent substack post here, which is succinctly titled:

Woman, 32, walks around the block to see if somebody discarded her recently stolen purse.

It was gone. The purse that, as it always does, held too much. The credit cards and checkbook. The passport and travel cash. 

The fault was all mine, as was heavily inferred by the police officer writing my report. I knew this, as I heavily inferred in return. I had forgotten to take my purse out of the cargo bike when I locked it up out front instead of bringing it in the house. (The real “instead of” was putting the bike back in the garage had my keys not been locked inside the car blocking the garage.) As you can tell, today was a constant realization that I’m asking my brain to do too much because it stopped doing all the important stuff at the same time. 

Anyways - the bike. The very used cargo bike that lives in a neighborhood where bike thefts are frequent. (I’m guessing all chicago neighborhoods feel this way?) The very used cargo bike that - despite being very used - belongs to a unique and more expensive category of bikes. What likely happened is that someone strolled by to see if they could roll the bike away, and when they couldn’t, realized they were being offered a small purse instead. How generous! 

I’ve gone back and forth between feeling so foolish for accidentally leaving the purse out there, to then reminding myself that the wrong was still theirs. I left the purse, but they did the wrong by deciding to take it. After that, I chide myself for thinking that way because I don’t want to become embittered with the petty theft that exists here. 

I’m writing this after cancelling all of the cards and accounts, and planning my errands for replacing important things in the morning. The real marathon will be reinstating all of our automatic payments.

When I think about that purse being gone, I’m happy. The process of starting at ground zero is a cleansing one, even if its timing was unexpected and unmerited. But when I think of the gift cards I kept with an average of $7 on them that I’ll never use, I feel good. When I think about the checkbook that was 2 addresses old and I had to change by hand with every check, I feel good. My keys were not in my purse (because they were locked in the car!) and for that I feel really good. Neither were my AirPods or any other valuables. 

I’m rethinking what I want my future purse situation to even be. A wallet I can easily switch between bags? Cute, occasional purses and canvas totes for longer days out? At this point I’m not planning to make any purse or wallet purchases, but instead see what I can find and make work from my closet. (Update: my moms closet provided an old makeup pouch that was once my grandmas that is now my wallet! A canvas tote from Unearth in Brooklyn carries the wallet and whatever else I need that day.) What I do know about my new purse situation is this: I’m done with old gift cards, receipts, and lipsticks that can’t keep the lid on. 

The burn it all down and start from scratch model feels entirely too good. Next time, though, I need to go for a controlled burn approach instead of accidentally setting a whole forest on fire on a Thursday afternoon.