100 Legendary Trunks

In October 2010 the luxury luggage brand Louis Vuitton released a rather extraordinary book called 100 Legendary Trunks, in which is featured some of the most interesting luggage-type creations owned by some of the world’s most intriguing characters. Houdini had one, Hemingway had one, and Lagerfeld had one, all which kept their chosen luggage safe and sound.

Thinking about how creative and original each of these pieces of luggage are got me to thinking: we get specialized cases made for our physical possessions, but what about our emotional baggage? Unlike our wardrobes, book collections, and our writing desks, we can’t just pack up all the heartaches, arguments, tears, and confusion to be unpacked at a later date. No matter how hard we try to mentally compartmentalize our trauma it seems to leak out at the most inopportune moments. I’ve had those moments where I have no reason to burst into tears, but my eyes just won’t stop leaking, so I know you’ve all had them too. Thankfully I move very quickly past depression into anger because it’s more productive. Maybe the trick isn’t to pack away our trauma, but to channel it into new projects, new jobs, new destinations, new lovers, anything as long as it’s a new direction. Or you can go spend thousands of dollars on therapy, and we all know that money could be harnessed into something more useful. Like a new Louis Vuitton trunk and a plane ticket so you can go on that fabulous vacation to Mallorca!

Mallorca photo courtesy of this website