Bearing the Unbearable Burden

My wife’s purse is packed with so many pounds per square inch that I risked dislocating my shoulder when she periodically asked me to carry it “for a moment” as she looked through racks of clothes at the mall.

“Hon, did you know that your purse could double as a training device for those sturdy Eastern European female weight lifters?” I asked.

“Oh, I can lighten it easily,” she replied. “All I have to do is take out your wallet, your keys, your phone, your breath mints and your bottle of water to drop two-thirds of the weight. Let’s face it Dave, it’s our purse.”

“That is not funny! You know how my back hurts if I drive with my wallet in my hip pocket.”

“And your keys are too bulky, and so is your cell phone, and so is everything else. I don’t mind that we have a joint purse as long as you carry it too,” she said.

“It isn’t a joint purse!” I whispered lest any other shopper heard us.

But she was not listening. She found a dress she liked, and she asked me to stand by while she tried it on. But asking me to hold her purse indicated that she did not grasp the enormity of the crisis.

“Hon, people will think I am cross-dressing!” I pleaded.

“Oh, stop overreacting,” she said, blowing me a kiss as she walked to the dressing rooms.

There was no way I was going to get caught like this. So I scampered over to the accessories section, hung her purse on a rack, and pretended to be shopping.

“Hmmm. I wonder what color purse I should buy for my wife,” I said aloud for the security cameras.

“Can I help you?” asked a clerk.

“I am, uh, shopping for my wife,” I said.

“Well, just let me know if I can be of any help,” she said.

I was about to thank her when my phone began ringing. From the purse on the rack in front of me. Every muscle in my body went into rigor mortis panic mode.

Ring.

“How odd,” remarked the clerk, staring at the purses before us.

Ring.

I went into full projectile sweat mode as she pulled Dale’s bag off the rack.

Final ring.

“Mercy, someone must have lost her purse,” she said.

“How about those Rams?” I asked.

She opened the purse.

“Goodness, there’s a man’s wallet in here. Maybe we can contact the owner,” she said, flipping my wallet open.

She looked at the mug shot, glanced up at me, and then her hand fluttered to her mouth.

“I can explain everything,” I said.

The phone rang again, and I grabbed it.

“Where are you? I thought you were going to wait outside the dressing room,” Dale said.

“This is an emergency. I am going to hand the phone to this lady, and you need to tell her we are married and that I am holding your purse because you made me,” I said.

Oh, they had a riotously good chat that was punctuated by much merriment and gasps for breath.

“You are soooooooo male,” my wife said when we were finally reunited.

I decided then and there to get a waist pack and carry all my own stuff. I figure I can even carry some of Dale’s stuff when we go walking or camping.

In a very real way, our marriage helps us to practice the biblical mandate to “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2).

I would feel even better about my new pack had Dale not pointed out that, realistically, it is nothing more than a purse that you strap on your body.

I wonder if she will wear it for me?