The Old Broken Fork

Once upon a time, my husband’s grandmother was engaged to be married. (It’s hard to think of her as that young woman in her early twenties. She’s been old as long as I’ve known her.) Her fiance’s aunt and uncle took her shopping for a wedding present and were determined to buy flatware for the young couple. Grandma had a definite picture in her mind of what she wanted on her table. Having grown up on a farm in Oklahoma, she was used to making-do and going without, but when she dreamed of being a grown-up, she imagined shiny silver utensils gracing her dinner table.

Her fiance’s aunt thought that pretty had no place on a farmer’s table, that utilitarian and sturdy was the way to go. When grandma pointed hopefully at stainless steel with flowers on the handle, the aunt shook her head and picked out plain with wooden handles. His poor grandmother fought back tears and said, ” But I don’t really care for that set.” Nothing was purchased that day, but at the wedding a few weeks later the whole family exclaimed over the generosity of the aunt and uncle who gave an entire set of flatware and how sensible they were to get the sturdy kind with the wooden handles.

Eventually the tine broke off of one of the forks. Grandma smiled to herself that the “sturdy” set had broken. It wasn’t long before she discovered that the broken part of it made it into and ideal hook for fishing things out of pots and flipping bacon. It became her trusty utensil and was more used than anything else in her kitchen.

For 10 years, she lived with the set that she hated. She squirreled pennies away in the hope of replacing her ugly silverware. When she had enough money saved, this frugal child of the depression drove her flatware to the dump where she stood for a momentary pause before gleefully flinging it into the pit….all of it except the broken fork.

When I met her, she was already slowing up with age, but still had all of the fire of her early days. Sunday mornings at her house were always church followed by a big breakfast which she insisted on making. In her hand as she regaled us with family stories was an old wooden handled fork with a broken time.

His grandmother is dying now, slowly slipping away form us. It is hard to look at her quiet frame and see any trace of the woman she has always been. She looks so quiet and frail. But when I go home, I look on my window sill and see that old worn out fork and I remember the defiance of a woman my own age who flung the detested set into the trash heap and then laughed all the way home. I remember the aged and caring hands of a kind and generous woman who made breakfast for her grandson and his new bride and passed on the history of their family with pride and a bit of humor. I remember the first time she put that fork into my hand and asked me to finish the bacon because she had to sit down. It felt as if she was passing the torch from one generation to the next.

I am not a sentimental person who gets attached to material things, but I’m kind of in love with my old broken fork.