A Small Multitool Became My Most Used Everyday Carry Item
The day didn’t fall apart without it. I still opened emails, drank bad coffee, sat through a meeting that could’ve been an email. But there were these tiny pauses where I felt the absence. A loose screw on my chair arm I kept meaning to tighten. A plastic clamshell package at lunch that I ended up tearing open like a raccoon instead of cutting clean. Nothing serious. Just a handful of small frictions stacking up.
I didn’t always carry one. For a long time, it felt like overkill. I had a drawer at work with a screwdriver and a pair of scissors, and at home there was a junk drawer that handled everything else. Carrying tools on my person felt like planning for problems that probably wouldn’t happen between the car and the office.
What changed wasn’t some big moment. It was more like noticing how often I avoided dealing with little things because the right tool was ten steps away, or in another room, or buried in a bag I didn’t feel like digging through. A loose battery cover stayed loose for a week. A bent staple sat on my desk until I finally tossed the whole thing instead of fixing it. Nothing urgent enough to act on, but just annoying enough to notice.
The first multitool I stuck with wasn’t even that good. A little too thick, edges a bit sharp, the kind of thing you’re aware of every time you sit down. It printed through lighter pants and made my pocket hang slightly crooked. I remember adjusting it constantly, sliding it forward or back, trying to find a spot where it would disappear.
It never really did. But I kept carrying it anyway.
Part of it was stubbornness. Once something makes it into your pocket for a few days in a row, it starts to feel like it belongs there. You build around it without realizing. Phone shifts to the other side. Keys get clipped instead of dropped loose. The multitool becomes this quiet anchor point, even if it’s not especially comfortable.
And then you start using it, not in any dramatic way, just small corrections throughout the day. Tightening a screw on a cabinet door at work while you’re waiting for something to load. Snipping a loose thread off your sleeve instead of pulling it and making it worse. Prying open a battery compartment without hunting for a coin.
None of those things justify the weight on their own. If you listed them out, it would look like a weak argument. But they don’t happen in isolation. They show up scattered through the day, and having the tool there turns them from “later” into “done.”
I’ve stopped carrying it a few times. Usually in the summer, when pockets get lighter and everything feels more noticeable. Shorts make you honest about what you actually want on you. A multitool can feel like a brick when you’re just running out for coffee or walking the dog.
Those weeks are always a reset. At first it’s a relief. Cleaner pockets, less bulk, nothing digging into your thigh when you sit in the car. Then the small inconveniences creep back in. You start borrowing tools again, or just ignoring minor fixes because they’re not worth the effort.
Eventually I pick it back up, and the first few days feel heavy again. I notice every ounce. Then, like before, it settles in. Not because it got lighter, but because my habits shifted around it.
I’ve tried smaller ones, the kind that almost disappear on a keychain. Those are easy to carry, but I find I use them less. Not because they don’t work, but because they feel like a compromise when you actually need them. On the other end, the bigger ones solve that problem but bring back the pocket issue. There’s always some negotiation happening between what you’re willing to carry and what you expect it to do.
At this point, I don’t think of it as picking the “best” one. It’s more like finding the version you’ll tolerate on an average Tuesday. Not a day when you’re fixing things on purpose, just a normal, slightly boring day where the most demanding task might be opening a package or tightening something that’s been loose for a while.
The one I carry now still annoys me sometimes. It’s just noticeable enough that I take it out when I get home and set it on the same spot by the dresser. Some nights I consider leaving it there the next morning.
Sometimes I do. And then a few days later, I’m standing at my desk, nudging a loose screw with my fingernail, thinking about that spot on the dresser again.