A weight off my shoulders

Literally.

I stopped carrying my laptop to the office. When Michael got his new allocation computer from Penn, I inherited his old, somewhat banged-up but still serviceable MacBookPro, which now lives in the bottom drawer of my office filing cabinet and has taken over duties as my work computer. That means that I don't need to schlep my own laptop into the office anymore. It stays happily ensconced on my desk, and I just keep my vital documents sync'd between the two computers via Dropbox (what a lifesaver!). Sure, I still to carry my purse and a small bag for my lunch, but it's a massive improvement.

Really, it's almost criminal how happy this makes me. No more worrying about tumbling down the stairs in high heels because my weight balance is off. No more shifting the laptop bag from hand to hand and back again as it gets too heavy to carry. No more feeling like a kindergartener, heading off to school with a sack full of crayons strapped to her back. I'm an adult now! I'm free!

And yet, I seem to be experiencing a strange sort of phantom limb syndrome. I'll get to campus, park my car, collect my purse and my lunch, and start walking to the office. About halfway there I'm overcome with the feeling that surely I have forgotten something important. Surely. I'll start to stoop over, almost unconsciously, trying to recapture what it would feel like to be walking to work if I hadn't forgotten something. I'll reach up to grab at my shoulder, trying to figure out why that space feels so wrong and weightless. And then --- aha! I'm not wearing my computer bag! Because I don't need to be! My posture straightens, my eyes brighten, my step lightens, and I can head for the office like a normal human being. Until the next morning, of course, when it happens again.

I'll get over it soon, I'm sure. I'm so happy to have worked out a good system whereby I can have all my file both at my office and at home and not have to get a horrible crick in my neck while doing it. (That can wait until I'm actually seated at my computer and hunch over my keyboard to type.)

The only drawback to the new system is when I need to travel. Until I spring for an iPad, there will still be times when I'll have to take my laptop with me (conferences come to mind), and then it will be back to the neck-cricking and ankle-wobbling. Such is life.

But even on those occasions, I'm never going back to my old nylon laptop bag. It served its purpose reasonably well, but it really did make me look like a kindergartener --- nearly took up the entire space on my back even though it was meant to be a messenger bag (for a six-foot tall Amazon, I suppose). Nope, I've dug out my old, skinny neoprene laptop sleeve and have my eye on a sensible and versatile (and vegan!) tote bag from Crystalyn Kae. After all, what's the point of being an adult if I can't look like one?