I moved to a new apartment two weeks ago. Three blocks south from my last place, still in the East Village. When moving, I had to do a handbag inventory count.If I have one vice, it would be my addiction to acquiring luxury handbags.
I counted. One, two, three...fifteen, sixteen, seventeen...twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty-eight. twenty-eight. That scared me a little. How on earth did I manage to accumulate TWENTY-EIGHT handbags in a bedroom too small to hold a bed any larger than twin??
The answer turned out to be obvious. A boyfriend with extra closet space.Regardless, I had to downsize. I donated the "ordinary/beat-up bags", and kept only the ones I would use on a regular basis. I trimmed and trimmed, and finally decided to:
- ship 2 "special bags" back to Hawai'i for use on my visits home
- keep 3 "everyday bags" in my apartment
- keep 5 "special bags" and 2 "everyday bags" at Monsieur P's
From 28 to 12. I felt pretty proud of myself.
At Monsieur P's we devoted a whole closet to the 7 bags I allotted myself. SOOOO superficial? Yes. As long as you can acknowledge that, it's alright. After "downsizing" I felt light and rather happy, done away with the bags I didn't use. 12 is all a lady really needs.
I was fine for a few weeks. But then I got an itch on this Tuesday morning. Phyllis called, "meet for lunch in Soho in an hour?" The answer was a definite 'yes'.
Well, lunch didn't happen till three hours later, because we both scratched the itch and wound up with new handbags. A Mulberry for her, a Chanel (pony hair, pictured above) for me. Ahh it felt good to scratch!
I have to confess that I always panic for a few minutes after every bag purchase, running through my head all the things I could have "better" done with that money: two macbooks, five meals at Per Se, three Leica dlux4 cameras, insurance, new eyeglasses, apartment rent!But "better" is relative. And I have to say that I've never regretted a single bag purchase.
I was back at Monsieur P's later in the day, rearranging, making room for 8.From Left.
Bottom Row: a Louis Vuitton from my grandmother (she's had it since the 80s!); a Chanel my mom bought for my college graduation (fits files nicely, good for work).
Middle Row: a small Escada clutch (see it barely peeking out from the left, gift from my mom); a white leather Bally (light, carefree, weekend shopping appropriate), and then my new Chanel pony hair (so excited to use it!).
Top Row: JCrew, Banana Republic clutch (owned both these for years now, always reliable, the "everyday bags"); a big (gigantic, really) Chanel (you should see how much this bag holds, its mindboggling).
And so not 12, but 13. We'll stop at lucky 13 in total.
