Fork of my Youth

When I was little, I had this special little fork. I don't remember now specifically what it was. What I do remember was that it was much smaller than the fork my parents and older brother used. It was my fork. The silver end had three prongs. The plastic end that I held had a little robot on it. In retrospect, it was probably some silly promo fork, probably for, like, Transformers, or something, but I didn't understand that. There was a sweet robot on my fork. I really liked eating stuff with that fork when I was little.

Every day during elementary school my mom would pack my lunch. I would always beg my mom to pack my fork so that I would be able to eat lunch with it. Again, I really liked that fork. There was a certain pride I felt when I ate with that fork that I have been unable to rekindle even today.

On certain very special days, my mom would give in to my request and pack my fork with my lunch.

I remember very specifically one day that she packed it and I was really excited to see it in my lunch box. I don't remember what I used to eat with it, but I felt like a king. At the end of lunch time, I would take my trash over to the big trash cans where everyone threw their trash away and where the poorer kids would return the trays on which they carried their school-bought lunch. I'm not sure what happened, but I wasn't paying very close attention to my trash that day. At some point, my very special fork got caught up on the plastic baggies and tupperware that my food was packed in. When I threw my trash away, my fork went with it. I didn't even notice at the time.

When I got home from school that afternoon I unpacked my lunchbox and found my fork to be missing.

I started crying.

I cried a lot when I was a kid, about silly things, but I have no regrets about this cry.

It's actually weird, even to this day, when I think about that little fork, and that I threw it away by accident, tears come dangerously close to my eyes.

-Colin