The prompt in our writing group was “Breadcrumbs.” As usual, I fell into the rut of SOC (stream of consciousness) writing.
Pinky’s beads are really cool and I hope that nobody uses them for breadcrumbs. Although as metaphorical breadcrumbs, I suppose they are suitable, so I am going to go against the hope I recently expressed.
Just what is a breadcrumb? I am not talking about a single breadcrumb, of course, or even the scattering of breadcrumbs left next to the plate of a messy eater like myself. Or even the thinner scattering of breadcrumbs that might be found at the place recently used to open a bag of sliced bread, or to slice a loaf of home baked bread. No, I am talking about breadcrumbs in a line, or a nominally one dimensional curvy pseudo-line, intentionally left as a clue to where to find something. Or by metaphorical stretch, how to find something. Or by further metaphorical stretch, how to figure something out.
The point being that someone else has already figured out how to accomplish the target, shall we say, of the breadcrumbs.
Of course calling Pinky’s beads breadcrumbs implies that Pinky herself intentionally left clues. But again, by metaphorical extension, maybe we can still legitimately call the beads breadcrumbs, even if she only unintentionally created breadcrumbs along with the beads.
For how does the one who sees the trail of breadcrumbs know unequivocally whether they were intentional, and thus truly breadcrumbs, or unintentional, and thus simple data? Unless we have separate data as to the intentionality, these metaphorical cases are harder to classify as either true breadcrumbs, or the result of our natural human tendency to find patterns where none exist.
With actual breadcrumbs, it is easier to see that it was intentional, especially, as in the case of the original breadcrumb story from which most of us probably get our idea of a trail of breadcrumbs leading us on. That story being, of course, Hansel and Gretel. But if we think a little harder, we are reminded that the breadcrumbs were a failure, until metaphorical breadcrumbs in the form of small stones were substituted.
Personally, I am struggling to recall the details of the story. Did Hansel’s metaphorical breadcrumbs lead Gretel to risk? These children were really smart, I just realize, to carry out the breadcrumb experiment in the first place, and keep modifying their procedure as needed.
So, back to Pinky’s beads. To me, they are breadcrumbs because we see Pinky’s creative mind at work. They help us figure out a little bit of how Pinky’s mind works. They let us see that she saw a way to make complexly patterned colorful cylindrical beads out of a flat piece of colored paper, through the use of a double symmetry procedure around mutually perpendicular axes. Very cool. And this observation from someone who really struggled to pass her crystallography class in her junior year.
I don’t know if she told Jim Z how she made the beads prior to his explaining it to me, or whether Jim figured it out by himself. My first assessment was wrong. Doing it the way I originally thought after a cursory glance would probably not look as good. Doing it the way she did it, rolling the paper around a chop stick, removing the chop stick from the center of the now cylindrical piece of paper, flattening the cylinder to create a very skinny and thick strip, which she then rolls into a disk with a small hole conveniently left for a matching colored string to create a necklace, looks very good. Before attaching the string, the bead is coated with a shiny transparent gloss coat. Very cool. If I did it, due to my clumsiness, it would not look so nice.
Breadcrumbs to see Pinky’s creativity. Metaphorical breadcrumbs. Is it too much of a stretch?
If you like the idea of these beads, even if the only one I had left to take a picture of when I finally posted this today, having given the other four I bought to friends, leave a comment and I will send you info on how to reach Pinky. Maybe she has some left.
