Matters of Size

My two suitcases are small, perfect for road trips or overnights.   

All week, I've been mentally packing just enough for four nights in one of my them.  I considered taking both, but when I pictured myself with one unreliable leg pushing two in the packed Atlanta airport, I go back to one. 

The sweater Day gave me for my birthday has to go--a bulky kimono-style sweater; it can get chilly in the mountains.  The camera, the laptop, four days' worth of clothes with alternatives for layering if it gets cold.  Chargers, medicines, toothpaste.  Bags of Apple Cider Pretzels.  My only boots.  

And then one night, after editing the list over and over, the obvious occurred to me like an epiphany.  I could buy a larger suitcase, go right into a store, not Amazon, people do it all the time, and get myself a brand new suitcase.  

I went to TJ Max and picked a teal one with orange zippers.  I opened it on the living room floor and put the sweater in, the pretzels, some clothes, my boots.  I left it open so that every time I think of something I might need, I can just put it in.

Luci, awake, is so lively she seems big.  If you open the back door in the night, she runs fearlessly into the dark, flying almost, toward some thing (or some one)  that needs scaring off.  She always runs to the same spot, as if all past intruders are still right where they were when she first spotted them.  Unlike me, she never looks cautiously before she leaps. Nor does she ask a stranger, "Do you mind if I jump on your legs?" 

But when she sleeps, curled up like a fawn, her size always surprises me.  Limp as a knot of rags, she's tiny enough to cup in two hands, smaller than most cats.

Folding washed clothes to go into the new suitcase, I notice that Luci is curled up inside between the boots and the Apple Cider Pretzels.  A canine Goldilocks, she's found the just right place for a nap.