When the nurse handed me my vaccination card she said, “Keep this in your wallet.” Hmm, where did I put my wallet? For the past year we’ve been paying for stuff online with a credit card.

I found my wallet and decided to do a little house cleaning. How much of this stuff do I really need to have with me every time I leave the house? I can pay for gas and groceries using my phone and ApplePay. And I’ve always kept some cash in a money clip. I see that some get by with their driver’s license and a credit/debit card in a phone case. Which got me wondering… do young folks still carry wallets?

“The difference between billfold and wallet is that a billfold is a small, folding sleeve or case designed to hold paper currency, as well as credit cards, pictures, etc while wallet is a small case, often flat and often made of leather, for keeping money (especially paper money), credit cards, etc.” (WikiDiff)

Forty years ago, when I started wearing suits to work, I carried a wallet in the inside pocket of my suit coat. (The one on the left in the photo below). When I hung up the suits for last time, I switched to a “billfold” (middle) and kept it in a pocket of my laptop case.

Along the way I kept looking for ways to lighten the load and tried some that didn’t fold at all. Just some pocket for credit cards and a magnetic money-clip. I’m giving that a try as I get back in the world.

I’ve long been fascinated by “fat wallets” and collected a few photos over the years. Each of the wallets pictured below were carried in the hip pocket. I would have dearly loved to got through the contents of each of these. What a story they could tell.

And no discussion of wallets would be complete without George Costanza’s exploding wallet. Another scene from the Wallet episode.