The other day I was at the store and I pulled out my trusty wallet to pay for my groceries. I unzipped it to get my credit card out and then struggled to zip it back up. Perhaps struggled is the wrong word. It’s more accurate to say that I simply couldn’t zip it up.
Why? Because the darn zipper broke.
I was sad because it has served me well for at least a decade, maybe 15 years. It’s the perfect size and the zipper ensures that nothing falls out. When it works, that is. It’s something that took me a while to find but I suppose that 15-ish years means that I got my monies worth out of it.
Here’s a picture of where the zipper broke and it isn’t worth paying someone to fix it, not when I have a whole collection of new ones to choose from.
One of my favorite fandoms is Harry Potter and I’ve got quite a collection of bags, including wallets. All I had to do now was choose a new one for everyday use. But it wasn’t as simple as choosing my favorite based on looks.
No, there were a few things I was looking for:
- Size – It had to be big enough to carry all the cards, cash, and coins that I keep on me at all times.
- Card Slots – It had to have enough slots to fit all the cards I have, which include my driver’s license and credit/debit, insurance, AAA, Good RX, and Sam’s Club cards.
- Coin Holder – I carry cash with me so a place to keep coins from falling out is a must.
This is how nicely everything fit inside my previous one, with the middle zipper section where coins were kept:
Honestly, I wasn’t sure if any of the ones that I have would meet my criteria, so I accepted that I might need to buy a new wallet instead of use one from my collection. Here is what I had to choose from:
You can probably guess that at least half of them weren’t going to work just by looking at the picture because they were much too small. I was able to eliminate the bottom four without even checking to see if they would work.
That left the top four, and I hoped that one of them would meet my requirements. I opened each one and looked to see if they could hold my coins, cards, and cash. They all had zippered compartments for coins but most didn’t have enough card slots, or it was too difficult getting cards in and out.
I am happy to say that one, just one, of the wallets that I already had met my criteria. It’s this one, which matches a purse that I have. Not that I care about matching my wallet to my purse, although other people do, but they will match whenever I use that particular crossbody bag.
Here is what I am now carrying with me in my purse. I’ll still use the other ones but only when I don’t need to have everything with me.
It took me longer to write all of this than it did to figure out which one would work, but it was fun looking through what I have. I confess that I didn’t realize all the requirements that I have until I wrote them down. What requirements do you have for yours?