Packing is an art. Packing is like architecture. The starting point is to look at your suitcase as if it were a city. A place composed by multiple spaces. Spaces that litterally change through time. There are two contextual conditions: the space of departure and the space of return. The easiest one is no doubt the first one. You pack, you stress always knowing that you'll forget something vital, you stack things with one and only criteria...leave some empty spaces. The space of return. It's funny that I always plan the spaces within my suitcase based on the return! It's like planning my future memories!
It is not about souvenirs as they are collectively known. I can care less about those "fill the space above the fireplace with memories" such as those ridiculous snow globes with every possible city inside. I've always wondered why people would buy those balls. And place it on top of their fireplace...isn't that a contraddiction?
I don't consider those souvenirs (from Old French, to recall, memory, from Latin subven re, to come to mind ) but a total waste of space. My souvenirs are my memories, psychologically talking or, my photographs where I capture moments, visual infos that I want to remember.
I adore to collect the stickers they put on your luggage saying where it is coming from and where it has (possibly) to go. My souvenirs don't really take space within the landscape of my suitcase. And the best thing about these sort of souvenirs is that they are not heavy! How much do you think a memory in your brain weights? Who knows? The memory of me and my friends eating at Johnnie's Pastrami is going to be heavier than the one of me eating an apple at the beach reading a book I bought at Barnes and Noble? The thing that I am sure is that the books I'll buy are going to be heavy. Now the art of packing comes handy. Like an urban renewal. Like rethinking a city. The city within the suitcase. Fill it up without disturbing the internal balance that was already there before! You just renew the internal conditions.
Like a city, a suitcase has memories. More than what it can hold inside. Like a city, a suitcase will hold stories, anecdotes you will carry on in the future. But a suitcase, when old and useless you can keep it as a rememberance, as a souvenir. An old building will either be demolished. Why not keep it. Renew it. And hopefully reintegrate it in the urban landscape. A future memory. An urban souvenir. For real. In no ball. With snow. Over your fireplace.
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