Our Daily Bread

I started keeping these bread clips in January 2022. At that time they were used to hold some cables in the apartment in Neukölln. There was a lot to hold and collect in that apartment. Our friend Marlene left it to us so that we would have time to look for an apartment to stay in for good. It was a half-finished apartment, with old furniture and decor from a photo studio. And some things somewhat precarious, in need of attention. While we lived in it, I repaired what I could in gratitude to Marlene and as a sign of good will with the new time we were starting. In fact, before I left I replaced the clips with flanges, half to make everything more decent, half to keep the clips.

I don’t know exactly what prompted me to keep them when we moved to the second floor – there was a third. There everything was in perfect condition. My wife laughed at me as she recalled oyster eccentricities of mine. First I kept them in a chewing gum jar, but on the next floor, we kept buying bread and I kept keeping the paper clips. What for? I don’t know. I still wonder today, but there they are, three years old. I’m sure there’s an answer.

I am beginning to forget the stores where we used to shop, the corner stores and supermarkets. In Graz I continued to keep them until last January. Three years is enough, at some point you have to stop to make sense of the action, the object. Three years of places, trips, people, meetings, meals and parties. We have shared bread all this time with friends and family. When I was little I did similar things. I kept all kinds of junk, sometimes attracted by the shape, sometimes by the color or the rarity, but it’s too easy a connection.