Why Does My Backpack Look So Small?

Every day closer to our departure date my backpack begins to look smaller and smaller. I realize we have committed to our year adventure in a carry on and I don’t plan to change that, but while we are still at home surrounded by our stuff it seems near impossible to believe everything I need will fit in a 36 L backpack.

I am not complaining about wearing the same clothes over and over because that is what I do at my job currently. 🙂 While training I wear the same black pants and top to work while washing it throughout the week. I think about what I use daily and I know it would fit in a backpack, but its the rest of the stuff and having the option to use it if I want to. It is giving up the luxury of having a blender in case you want to make a smoothie or all three seasons of Arrested Development on DVD for a sick day. You never know when you will need 15 lb dumbbells at home because you are too lazy to go to the gym or want to have the option of 10 different nail polish colors. There are a lot of things around the apartment that we use maybe once a year, they aren’t necessities and are simply taking up space for those chance occasions we want to use them.

During a recent practice packing session, Josh and I couldn’t stop laughing at the difficulty we were having. It was like trying to pack a watermelon in a coin purse. I have heard it before, to try packing your bag and then take away half of it and repack. We are getting creative and looking at everything very functionally whether we need it or not and if we can pick it up while on the road.

Grasping the idea of traveling 9 to 5 with the bare minimum is both exciting and scary. Once I take the leap I know I won’t miss my George Foreman grill but until then I will enjoy the fact that I have Netflix, magazine subscriptions and a great gym membership in Chicago.

Hopefully the bag won’t look so small once we finish getting our clothes, shoes and other gear together. We have a mini practice trip coming up in December to Florida so we will see how we like traveling with our backpacks!