Cutting Wisdom

Until the summer before last, it had never occurred to me—I declare it hadn’t—that carrying a pocketknife made me unusual. Saying “I declare” in that way does make me unusual, and old, but I accept that and don’t do it regularly. Carrying a pocketknife, on the other hand, is like carrying a wallet and keys to me.

And nobody has ever at my carrying a wallet and keys. (Not yet, anyway—no doubt the time will come.) Summer before last (couldn’t have been last summer because, you know, the COVID), I was at a picnic with some New York people I didn’t know well, and this one woman couldn’t get the string loose from a package of deli meats.