I was sitting at the train station, waiting for my 7:30 AM train to take me to work. I was thirsty, so I took a swig of my water bottle and plonked it back into my bag. After a minute, I felt a coldness in my lap. I lifted my bag and saw dark blue patches of wetness on jeans. How strange!

Furrowing my eyebrows, I looked at the bottom of my bag — it was all wet! I yanked the flap open and pulled out the water bottle. Sure enough, the previously full bottle was empty and the bright yellow cap lounged rakishly on the lip. I reached into the bag and grimaced as I felt the wetness.

At that moment, the train arrived.

I’m quite proud of what I did next. Normally, after doing something extremely silly, I flail about uselessly, berating myself. However, this time I calmly began pulling everything out of the bag. I flipped the empty bag inside-out and shook out a drink bottle’s worth of water. I wiped the bag down with my tissues and quickly began replacing its contents. Then I hopped onto the train.

I discovered an interesting thing that day. Nearly everything in my bag is waterproof. Isn’t that wonderful?