A Bag in a Hurry

Not all bags are packed for adventure. Some are filled in haste, not with excitement, but with fear. Some are packed not to prepare for a destination, but to escape a disaster. I never thought I’d come to know this kind of bag so intimately—the one you pack not to travel, but to survive. My name is Maryam. I’m twenty-six years old, and I have been forcibly displaced eleven times. Each time, I had only minutes to gather what remained of a life carefully built over the years. No time to say goodbye to a home, only time to stuff whatever I could into a single bag. The bag I do not love. The bag that holds no joy, no plans, no dreams. Only survival. I remember one moment more vividly than the rest—the day we had to leave again. Another warning had come, another leaflet dropped from the sky like a sentence. We had just a few minutes to flee. My heart beat so loudly I could barely hear my own thoughts. I stood in the middle of our home—our fragile, worn-down but beloved home—paralyzed by the question echoing in my head: How do you fit a whole life into one bag? There was no time to decide alone. I turned to my three-year-old son, Kamal, and gently asked him, “My little one, choose just one toy, one coat, and one pair of pants. That’s all we can take.” His room was filled with the sweet chaos of childhood—stuffed animals, toy cars, tiny shirts folded by my hands. He sat down on the floor and clutched a yellow toy bulldozer. “Can I take this?” he asked. “I played with it all day yesterday, and I promised Daddy I’d take care of it. How can I leave it behind to get ruined?” Then he looked up at me, holding a small shirt. “And this one, Mama—you gave it to me for my birthday.” How do you explain to a child that even memories must sometimes be left behind? I turned to my wardrobe next, my own heart in pieces. What two items would I carry with me? A shirt tied to a memory? A dress my husband once gave me? Or the warm coat that stood between me and the winter chill? Each piece of clothing wasn’t just fabric—it held meaning, comfort, love. And now, I had to choose between them, knowing I’d be leaving a part of myself behind with every item that didn’t make it into the bag. Although I’ve never packed a suitcase for a vacation, never filled it with bathing suits, cameras, or books, I imagine it feels nothing like this. This kind of packing is different. It’s frantic. It’s heartbreaking. Clothes are tossed in blindly. Hands tremble. Tears fall silently. And thoughts drift to the things you can’t take—furniture, photos, a child’s drawing on the wall, the kitchen where you once made your family's favorite dish. With every item left behind comes a haunting question: Will I need this again? Will I ever see it again? Or will it be reduced to rubble, lost forever beneath the ruins? This is not a journey. It is a severing. It is the act of saving only the body while the soul remains behind—trapped in the spaces you loved, the people you kissed goodnight, the echoes of laughter, the sounds of a life no longer yours. With trembling hands, I gathered what I could—my husband, Kamal, our baby daughter Talia, some clothes, a little food. Kamal cried as we left, clutching his yellow bulldozer, the one he swore he would use to rebuild Gaza. I couldn’t bring myself to take it from him. I’ve lost count now—was it eleven times we fled? Twelve? Fourteen? It hardly matters anymore. What I remember is the feeling of safety before the war. A time when home was a place, not a memory. A time when love was something you lived in, not something you mourned. Now, love is a shadow that follows me, tucked between the seams of a hurriedly packed bag. And “home” is no longer a house with four walls—it is the unknown. Still, I hold on to that bag. Not because it’s full of what I need, but because it’s all I have left.