Bread ties, bread twists – nobody can agree on what to call those little pieces of plastic used to seal a bread bag. There are jokes about how stupid they are. Wasteful. Something we should've stopped making years ago. But everybody has them around. The sharp-edged things get stuck in drawers or under the stove and fridge. Some people collect them, along with stray bits of wire, rubber bands, grocery bags, and on and on. "You never know – it might come in handy."
That could be. It also could be that a bread tie is transcendent – both useful and useless. A metaphysical object, bridging two perspectives that should be in opposition, but probably aren't. Just like every one of us, useless and useful. It depends. You never know.
So ... one day you bring home a loaf of bread wrapped in paper. You've changed the paradigm. Huh. Should I save the paper?
