It has come to my attention that I am a walking, talking fashion faux pas.

The reason is that I don’t carry a spiffy man’s work bag and the consequence is that I emit vibes of discombobulation and disorganization. Which is even worse than wearing last year’s necktie.

And I’m not alone in my affliction.

The Wall Street Journal reported last week that a man striving to succeed in today’s pressure-cooker workplace should be mindful of the bag he carries to the office.

“While most men pay close attention to what they wear to work, they often don’t notice one key accessory: their work bag,” the Journal’s Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan wrote.

An executive of Coach bags told the Journal that a shabby satchel “sends a message that you’re not so put together and that you don’t pay attention to detail.”

This is not good news for a fellow who’s been known to use a Walmart bag for a briefcase.

I suspect I’m not the only guy in town who’s guilty of this. Maybe you’ve done it yourself — or live with somebody who has.

In the hustle and bustle of making a living, there comes a morning when your briefcase is simply too full to hold the stuff you need that day.

It’s 7:45 a.m. and you’ve got an 8 a.m. meeting, and the last thing you’ve got time to do is clean out your briefcase. So you grab an empty Walmart bag and start fresh.

It’s an efficient system, actually. When your plastic bag gets too full or starts to rip, you just get another one. Next thing you know, months have passed and you no longer even remember where you left your briefcase.

There are those who say this is a sign of a disorganized and inefficient professional man, and maybe they’re right. But I take comfort in the fact that few of my buddies are organized, either, and even fewer carry spiffy work bags.

Let’s be honest here. In the unlikely event a fellow wakes up one morning and feels an urge to carry a bag that’s on the cutting edge of fashion, there’s a major obstacle to overcome — the male psyche.

The Journal ran photos of trendy work bags for executives. One of them was a $478 “washed leather” tote that bore a striking resemblance to granny’s old purse — you know, that great big bag of hers that smelled like perfume and always had crumpled tissues and petrified sticks of chewing gum in the bottom.

Well, the tote bag in the photo looked a lot like one of those purses. Guys I know would haul their stuff in a trash bag before they’d get caught carrying a bag that could be mistaken for a purse. Most of them, anyhow.

The times are a-changing, though, and it’s tough to say what might be mainstream a few years from now.

Not long ago, it was rare to see a man wearing a fanny pack. Now they’re as common as Bermuda shorts and black dress socks on male tourists of a certain age.

So maybe tote bags will catch on with men — even those of us who trudge along in the weeds of the ditch that drains the fashion runway.

If you think about it, the only difference between a $478 leather tote bag and a plastic Walmart sack is the material. And $478, of course.

Donnis Baggett is publisher of the Waco Tribune-Herald . Email him at dbaggett@wacotrib.com.