The Fork

Into the Wilderness: Story 29

When my sister and I were very young, our mother gave us the choice of two sliver-plated forks. The forks had traveled the world- from the UK where her mother had been born, to Greece where she lived with her aunt and uncle for her entire childhood, across the Atlantic, through Ellis Island processing, then chugging across the country on a train to New Orleans. They had history.

Both forks were small, kid sized. My sister chose the dainty four-pronged, floral imprinted fork. I chose a three-pronged, smooth, unadorned “British” fork. I ate every meal with this fork. It was a first indication of my Anglophilia, along with a china rose-patterned tea set my mother allowed us to have afternoon tea with.

Once mine, the fork traveled from Oklahoma, to Hawaii, to New York City, to Binghamton, NY, back to Oklahoma, back to New York City, and finally to Bloomfield, New Jersey. And then it disappeared. It could have been in the move from Bloomfield to Wanaque. Or it could have accidentally gone in the trash- for my girls used to just throw plates and utensils away without separating them.

But I missed this fork. So much so that I researched until I found a similar stainless steel version- longer, less shiny- on EBay. It used to be the signature fork of British Airways. Part of my replacement’s appeal is that it also has travels, across oceans and continents, held by hands of travelers with their own journeys, their own memories. When using it, I am connecting across invisible generations, countless heritages and ethnicities, the same need to fulfill a basic human need.

Forks… the fork in the road, choices. Robert Frost said take “the one less traveled by” and Yogi Berra quipped, “when you come to a fork in the road, take it.” I’ve done both. I’ve decisively hurdled into an unknown- the time I sold a car, got on a plane and lived in Waikiki for a few months.

And then, I’ve taken the ones less traveled by. Raising neurodivergent daughters has been that- more so twenty years ago when they were born and no one diagnosed girls as they did boys and the term wasn’t even parlance. Now, neurodivergence is everywhere, on TikTok and Instagram, almost overused.

But fewer institutions have taken the fork of less traveled by. Some businesses speak the language of divergency but the culture does not adjust. Same with high schools and universities. Elementary schools seem to be doing better- here’s to all the elementary and nursery school teachers who saw my daughters and empowered them to succeed.

My daughters are on the road less traveled by. Athena is working and studying phlebotomy. She’s also doing animal portraits in her self-invented style. I’ll share some of her pictures in a future post.

Catina is a junior in university, also an artist handcrafting ornate, sculpted “boxes” from recyclables. And just this past weekend, Catina got married. Yes, married. And no, it’s not a shotgun wedding- which I seem to need to say for those traveling the usual paths. Catina chose her fork in the road- marrying her soulmate- rather than the usual steps we have come to believe are appropriate. I’ll share about this in the future too.

The point is: my neurodivergent daughters won’t be the typical kids following the typical paths, the paths most of my friends’ and acquaintances’ kids are taking. They are listening to their own playlist, maturing, creating, taking forks in the road leading to new, different, divergent. Less traveled by. Just there.

They also steal my three-pronged fork all the time. So now I have an entire set. We can each come to our own fork. And take it.