A Bent Fork

Summary:
From the book, "Break Out: Finding FreedomWhen You Don't Quite Fit The Mold,"a modern literary memoir of 51 short storiesabout what it means to be presumed different.

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"Conform and be dull."
J. Frank Dobie

I didn't appreciate its significance at the time. I thought it was hokey, so I threw it into the dump one day with yellowed notebooks, old TIME magazines and broken pencils as I cleaned my home office in a fit of tidiness. It was old, crude and falling apart -- a relic of the past. But, now -- several months later -- I wish I had kept it.

It was a four-by-eight wooden plaque which had been on my office wall at Wisconsin Dairies for 13 years. A cheap dinner fork, flattened at the tip of the handle and attached to the plaque by a single rivet, rested horizontally across the piece of wood without a pin for its tine end.

The handle, on the other hand, was bent into a bow-like configuration and abruptly popped out of the plaque. Below the fork, a golden rectangular plate, glued crooked onto the wood, read, "Dunn's Supper Club, Clayton, Wis, February, 1981."

Eight of us sat around the table that night, emotionally drained from long days of preparation but excited about the merger plans we were going to present to the employees and members of the Clayton plant the next day.

I had ordered steak and immediately began to carve the meat into small pieces so I could chew and swallow them without choking -- a fear I always had in the back of my mind.

My steak was tough and my fork weak. As I continued to cut my meat, I could feel the fork bend under my full grip. When I finished cutting, I held my fork up for everyone to see, and the group broke into laughter. Its handle was bowed into what reminded me of a two-year-old's first table utensil.

"Damn fork," I said softly, pretending to put the blame on the eating establishment but failing to keep a straight face.

"I think they need new tableware," Nancy offered as a alibi, "but, what the heck, it's northern Wisconsin."

"Hasse, you're just too rough with your stuff," chided Earl. "You're the only guy I know who can murder a fork like that."

Howard chuckled.

It was fun to have a group of co-workers share in the discovery of a little amusing incident in the happening, feel no embarrassment and enjoy the resulting camaraderie that spills into everyday work life.

The waitress flitted by Howard, and he asked for another fork.

I had lost track of the damaged fork during our meal and forgotten about it until Howard showed up in my office a couple of months later with the plaque. He had swiped the fork from the restaurant and had it mounted.

At the time, I was truly grateful to Howard. The plaque showed how much the incident, which I had forgotten, meant to him. I was accepted -- mumbled speech, crooked back, clanking crutches and all.

I had it hung on the wall across from my wood cut, and an occasional visitor would remark about the odd fork in back of my desk. I would explain about the tough steak, but its significance never really surfaced until I decided to quit my job to start my second career.

Yes, the fork was a tangible symbol of my acceptance within Wisconsin Dairies. But, the fork's odd curvature began to mean more than that to me as I evaluated my career alternatives at 50, left Wisconsin Dairies after 28 years of service and formed my own home-based communication counseling business.

Howard, without realizing it, had retrieved a piece of my life that taught me I was more than a person with a disability.

I was physically different, sure. But, despite the acceptance I experienced at Wisconsin Dairies on one level, I was always the odd one in the silverware drawer when it came to personal temperament, outside-work interests, management style and strategic focus.

That was nothing new. I often didn't fit neatly with others in terms of work, family, friends, lovers, church and school or in volunteer efforts and professional organizations. And, that didn't matter.

But, to give up a successful career -- and the apparent security I had -- to start my own business was the change in my life many co-workers and relatives just didn't understand.

I couldn't explain it adequately to others, either, for such a decision contradicted everything I had been trying to achieve since seventh grade: security. I had purposely bent my fork that, in my eyes, had always been straight.

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

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