I’m terrible at packing. Laughably terrible. Concerningly so. On a recent trip to Las Vegas with my boyfriend (I’m gay) and both our mothers (again, we are extremely gay) to see Adele (you get the idea), we both packed so much that you’d be forgiven for thinking we were moving there. I doubt Adele packed more, even though she semirelocated there for several months.
My boyfriend is, somehow, even worse than I am. His philosophy when it comes to luggage is progressive: Leave no shirts behind, lest they feel excluded from our vacation. He doesn’t want anyone at a hotel to see him in the same outfit twice.
With our traveling circus of luggage, we are hangers-on to an old way of life. Long gone are the days when you wouldn’t think twice about checking a bag and waltzing onto a plane empty-handed, knowing it was someone else’s problem. Today, there is intense pressure to pack light and travel exclusively with carry-on, leading to boarding processes so stressful they can feel like the wildebeest stampede from “The Lion King.” We’ve been forced to become our own baggage handlers — and we often have to pay for the privilege.
What other industry could get away with that?
None of us fully trust the airlines to get our bags to our destination. One 2013 survey found just 19 percent of passengers traveled exclusively carry-on; by last year, a separate survey had found that this carry-on-only group had climbed to 41 percent of travelers.
Carry-On, Pack Light: How Airline Screw-Ups Became Our Problem – The New York Times
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