“Ian, what have you in that bag.  We are away two weeks; you couldn’t possibly need all that you have in there”.

I looked at the big green holdall sitting beside the compact blue bag that had been packed by Herself.  Admittedly, the bag was slightly larger and it did bulge a bit.  “It’s the bag.  There’s lots of empty space inside it.  If you’d had that bag, it would be just as large”.

“Have you everything? Have you books in your bag?” Non committal answer.

Later I attempted to slip a canvas bag filled with books in amongst the luggage.  Spotted, I had to remove the bag and insert the books amongst the compressed contents of the green holdall.

The necessity of the green holdall becomes apparent at family occasions.  Sitting with my nephew and Godson on one knee at the barbecue last night, I attempted to pour dressing onto one of my brother in law’s home made burgers and missed.  “Ian,” shouted Herself.

Unflapped, I mopped up the dressing covering my right leg.  Not a problem at all, there was another pair of similar coloured trousers in the bag.

Nor were the shoes drenched by English summer weather a problem, they could spend a couple of days drying.  The holdall held alternatives.

It is said that Imelda Marcos’ shoe compulsion arose from an alleged lack of footwear in her childhood days – her protestation that she had not 3,000 pairs of shoes, but only 1,600, only making the story seem even more absurd.

The green holdall arises not from a lack of anything, but from years of clumsiness; years of spilling things; years of finding mud and puddles; years of dropping things on the floor; years of getting unexpectedly wet.

It also means that there is no need to go to a shop to buy a jumper because the weather was ten degrees cooler than anticipated.  I stood smugly outside of the shop.  Had there been two green holdalls, there would have been no need to have gone shopping.