| By :
Mark Etinger
There was once was a plastic bag. He was born inside a plastic manufacturer plant outside Cleveland and wound up in a small grocery store in Akron. Late at night he and the other plastic bags, the wicketed bags and staple packs and tape bags would meet in the produce aisle and glide through the store, blown by the effervescent air conditioning breeze. He remembers his youth dearly, sometimes wishing he could return, knowing the impossibility of it all. Other die cut bags crossed his mind, there was one in checkout aisle four that he had seen in Cleveland, back when he was a bagling. But today there was little he could do to remind himself of how to talk to her - would she remember their early days in the factory; did she even know his name? One night, after he had spent a few hours with the tape bags and self seal bags, he wandered past her checkout counter. He called up, "Hey, aren't you from Cleveland?" hoping she would respond. Her voice was light and airy. He wondered if she was a polyethylene bag. "I am." "Come on down, I can't see who it is." Sure enough she floated down into the checkout aisle. That was the beginning of their love affair. Later, how much so he didn't know, it was her time to leave the food store. She whispered to him goodbye as she passed his checkout aisle. He didn't know what to do. He wished an incinerator would take him away. But soon it was his time. In the backseat of a car he was frightened and unsure. Within him was the hope that wherever he was going, she would already be there. He lived in a home for some time. The owners used him, were kind to him. And then one day, when he had been emptied of garden debris, they took him back to the store. He was an older plastic bag now. There were new wrinkles in his lining and whenever he moved he rustled loudly. They placed him in a recycle bin, where there were other old-timers. It was cramped but quiet and they were able to talk about different grocery stores and other bags they once knew. Soon thereafter they were emptied and brought to a recycling plant. Our old bag friend knew it was the end, but he also knew that there was something after, that he would return to from where he came and that it would all be okay.
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