My husband has a few things he carries with him every day in his pockets: his wallet, a pocketknife, and cherry chapstick. Every now and then he plays around with making an “everyday carry kit.” In a small Altoids tin he stashes more things you might need to survive in the wilds of South Asheville, like a pencil ground down to a nub, a bit of dental floss, and a tiny flashlight. Apparently, there’s a whole YouTube subculture of folks who make these kits. Some are preparing for a doomsday scenario or figuring out how to carry their firearms undetected. Others just like to have the right tool at hand when they need it.
It reminds me of a powerful book by Tim O’Brien. The Things They Carried contains fictional stories based on his time serving in the Vietnam War. In one, he writes about the things individual soldiers carried with them. The particular weapons and tools of war. The personal items from home that kept them going. The memories and fears and responsibilities they carried.
I’m thinking about another generation of young people fighting in Ukraine, carrying the same sorts of items with them, fearful and hopeful, determined and desperate. And I’m thinking about how all of us—wherever we are— put our small tools and talismans in our pockets, hoping we have what we need to get through the day.
What’s in your everyday carry kit today?
a writing prompt
Write about what you carry…
- in your heart
- on your back
- alone
- for others
an excerpt from The Things They Carried
They carried USO stationery and pencils and pens. They carried Sterno, safety pins, trip flares, signal flares, spools of wire, razor blades, chewing tobacco, liberated joss sticks and statuettes of the smiling Buddha, candles, grease pencils, The Stars and Stripes, fingernail clippers, Psy Ops leaflets, bush hats, bolos, and much more. Twice a week, when the resupply choppers came in, they carried hot chow in green mermite cans and large canvas bags filled with iced beer and soda pop. They carried plastic water containers, each with a two-gallon capacity. Mitchell Sanders carried a set of starched tiger fatigues for special occasions. Henry Dobbins carried Black Flag insecticide. Dave Jensen carried empty sandbags that could be filled at night for added protection. Lee Strunk carried tanning lotion. Some things they carried in common. Taking turns, they carried the big PRC-77 scrambler radio, which weighed 30 pounds with its battery. They shared the weight of memory. They took up what others could no longer bear. Often, they carried each other, the wounded or weak. They carried infections. They carried chess sets, basketballs, Vietnamese-English dictionaries, insignia of rank, Bronze Stars and Purple Hearts, plastic cards imprinted with the Code of Conduct. They carried diseases, among them malaria and dysentery. They carried lice and ringworm and leeches and paddy algae and various rots and molds. They carried the land itself—Vietnam, the place, the soil—a powdery orange-red dust that covered their boots and fatigues and faces. They carried the sky.
Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried. Houghton Mifflin, 2009
