Grip

[Paul Mackin]

On Aug 23, 2006, at 3:32 PM, Carvill John wrote:

> Not much of a coincidence perhaps, but the word 'grip', meaning  
> bag, stuck out in my
> mind when I read the ATD excerpt, then since I happened to be  
> nosing around online
> booksellers for a hardback copy of GR tonight, I thought I'd look  
> up that 'they are in love,
> fuck the war'passage via Amazon's 'search inside' feature, and  
> noticed it used there
> too. Funny noun, I've always thought, which I guess is why I  
> happened to notice it.
>
> GR page 41:
>
> "Jessica has brought an old doll, seashells, her aunt's grip filled  
> with lace knickers
> and silk stockings."
>
> ATD Excerpt:
>
> "...young Willis Turnstone, freshly credentialed from the American  
> School of Osteopathy,
> had set out westward from Kirksville, Missouri, with a small grip  
> holding a change of
> personal linen, an extra shirt, a note of encouragement..."
>
>
> Dictionary.com - which seems to have very recently had an interface  
> revamp - offers:
>
> "9 results for: grip
> .
> .
> 11. Older Use. a small traveling bag.
> .
> .
> a portable rectangular traveling bag for carrying clothes"
>
>
> Cheers
> JC
>
>


My late father had something he called a grip. It wasn't rectangular  
but more the shape of the kind of bag doctors' would carry for house  
calls, only bigger. As a child I associated it with la grippe  
(influenza) because sometimes when he would come back from a trip  
he'd set the bag down, step over it, and say, I  just got over the grip.

Lots of  fun our old dad.