I don’t want much. I just want the perfect suitcase.

I spend hours looking at suitcases and duffles and carry-on bags. I shop online, in department stores and at specialty shops. I read reviews and ask my friends for recommendations. I weigh the merits of outdoorsy rolling duffles, high-tech polycarbonate and ultralight nylon bags.

Occasionally, I make the sacrifice and buy the expensive bag and get my heart broken when it comes back to me with a broken zipper or missing wheel. Sometimes I make an impulse buy, snagging a bargain at an outlet or discount store and usually, but not always, after only a few flights, I’m disappointed.

Finding a good bag is no easy task. A suitcase has to be heavy enough to survive the battering it will take just getting through the airport and into the belly of the plane. But, it has to be light enough that I can manage it if I have to run through a busy terminal to catch a flight. It needs to fit in the overhead bin when I don’t want to pay a fee to check it. It has to be practical, with a place for everything. It needs wheels, but not just any kind of wheel. The perfect suitcase needs to roll in every direction, with only the barest touch. Oh, and I’d really like it to cost less than a week’s salary.

Of course, If I’m completely honest, there’s more than practicality involved. As with anything we wear or carry, a certain amount of vanity comes in to play.

I hate to admit it, but I think a suitcase can say something about its owner. Spend enough time in airports and you start to notice people and the bags they carry. You know what I mean. They don’t have to be in uniform; when you see men and women who have stacked and strapped their TravelPro bags into a tower of portable efficiency, you know it’s a flight crew.

Watching the older couple with the Avocado Green hard-body Samsonite you get the feeling they’re still using the suitcase they carried on their honeymoon, an investment that obviously paid off. And the woman who is holding the knockoff “Louis Vuitton” duffle while she scarfs down a Big Mac and waits with the crowd until time to board and squeeze into her economy seat? Well, she’s not fooling anyone.

I have a closet full of suitcases that promised great things and didn’t live up to expectations, but I keep on looking. Like I said, I don’t want much. I just want a travel companion that didn't cost an arm and a leg and won’t let me down. Oh, and if it happens to say to anyone who’s watching that "Here is a woman who
is really going somewhere," well, so much the better.

 

Question: Have you found the perfect piece of luggage? I'd love to hear your recommendation!

Cheryl-Anne Millsap is a travel writer based in Spokane, Washington, whose audio essays can be heard on Spokane Public Radio and on public radio stations across the country. She is the author of 'Home Planet: A Life in Four Seasons' and can be reached at catmillsap@gmail.com

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