Shaving Mirror
I am what I understand, and even if that understanding is flawed, I act upon that which I know.
I use a small "fog-free" mirror in the shower when I shave. Over the course of the past six months or so, this mirror has slowly lost its "fog-free" qualities and become more and more useless to me. And yet, when I shower and shave, I still use it. It reflects only the colors of my face, with blurred edges where my chin and eyes should be and absolutely nothing of any use in terms of the tiny hairs I'm attempting to hack away.
I have found, however, that if I run it under the stream of water for a few seconds and then remove it, I get a brief glimpse of the hairs that persist. So I shave, rinse the mirror, shave some more, rinse, shave, rinse, shave, until I'm done and have missed most of the hairs.
Regardless of its actual function, I continue to use it according to my understanding of its function. My mental model governs my interaction with the object. So, I stubbornly cling onto a useless piece of plastic and struggle to use it according to its original design, cringing at the numerous nicks I give myself. I am what I understand, and even if that understanding is flawed, I act upon that which I know; sometimes suffering the results of my own unrecognized ignorance.