A nation of urban beasts of burden

WASHINGTON -- I have always wanted one of those jobs where you don't have to carry anything. The queen of England and the president of the United States come to mind.
True, the queen carries a small purse, but I think I could safely dispense with that. But I really envy President Bush. He bounces out of the White House, across the lawn and onto his helicopter, Marine One, carrying nothing. He could be going to Camp David, his ranch, a foreign summit, and he does it empty-handed, not even a magazine or a paperback.
I know that a vast apparatus of bearers -- including the officer who carries the "football," the large black briefcase holding the nuclear launch codes -- makes this insouciance possible. Every time I see him get on or off Air Force One he's not even schlepping a carry-on bag. Even the pope carries a staff when he travels.
Going about one's business empty-handed brings back that delicious feeling the last couple of days before school let out when you didn't have to carry anything -- no books, no binders, no projects, no responsibilities other than to just show up.
French refugees
This feeling came to mind the other day walking to the office through the usual commuter pedestrian crush when I began thinking of old newsreels showing French refugees, trudging under the weight of their household goods, fleeing the Germans in 1940. I was also reminded of the old drawings of Plains Indians on the move, a horse pulling all the household goods on two parallel polls called a travois.
Since when did we become a nation of urban beasts of burden?
It's amazing how much stuff some of us carry on an ordinary workday. To the usual purses and briefcases we have added gym bags, backpacks, fanny packs and, over the last couple years, water bottle carriers and courier bags with a single strap that leaves your hands free -- to carry more stuff. That's so many straps going around your neck it's a wonder some poor drone hasn't strangled himself to death just getting ready to leave for work.
And here's the latest: Those airline suitcases that you tow behind you on little wheels, the resulting stoop and silhouette bringing to mind a Kiowa family on the move. And I know many of these people are not just in from, or about to leave for, the airport. No, they are using these mobile little suitcases to haul stuff to and from their offices. And some amplify their load by slipping a backpack or nylon satchel over the handle.
Electronic pedometer
Let us not forget all the stuff people are now carrying on their belts: cell phone, CD player, pager, neat little tool holster, walkie-talkie and the newest fad, an electronic pedometer to keep track of how far you've lugged all this gear.
And then there's one final touch. Those workers who wear their office ID everywhere, clipped to a pocket or a belt but most often around the neck and increasingly, in a style that I find kind of demeaning, in a special plastic holder with a thick strap. Not to dwell on newsreels but it puts you in mind of the tags the authorities placed around the necks of displaced persons arriving on the docks of New York City after World War II.
Technology assures that we need leave the house with little more than a hand-held. So the root cause must lie deeper, and I think I know where.
Do you know those tricycle baby strollers, the ones with the spoke wheels and rubber tires? In every one of them, the infant is packed in with bags of baby stuff, groceries or whatever. Thus infants are inculcated almost from birth with the notion that it is mankind's natural condition to be accompanied everywhere by large volumes of stuff. That's why toddlers tote backpacks to kindergarten.
Somewhere we have to start paring down, and here's a place to start that will both lighten the load and improve the scenery: Just because they're called cargo pants and cargo shorts doesn't mean their pockets have to be stuffed with cargo. Talk about a silhouette.
Scripps Howard News Service