Fork Buddies

When you’ve forgotten your fork and your place of employment does not provide plasticware because they don’t even provide a break room… eat salad with a spoon instead.

You know how some people have a ‘work wife’ or ‘work husband’? Well, I’ve got a coworker who’s my Fork Buddy. No, it’s not what you think. Here’s how it happened.

I always bring a lunch from home instead of eating out because I try to be frugal. Yay for being the spawn of two engineers. I typically eat a salad and bring a fork. My coworker, D, forgot his fork one day and asked if he could borrow mine. I wasn’t using it having brought a sandwich instead. “Sure,” I said, reaching into my lunchbox. I handed him the fork, only to realize it was the broken plastic one that I hadn’t thrown away yet. I have hoarder tendencies. “Aaaaand it’s broken….wait wait,” I said before he left. “I think I’ve got another one.” The next one I pulled out was dirty. “You’ll just need to wash it first,” I said. “No problem, thanks, D replied.” Later that week, it was my turn. On my walk into work, I had a nagging feeling that I hadn’t packed a fork. Sure enough, I’d taken it out to wash and hadn’t replaced it. I asked D, “Did you bring a fork today? I forgot mine.” He graciously shared his. You may be asking yourself, doesn’t your work have a breakroom with plasticware? An excellent question, I’m glad you asked. The answer is, no. My department being maintenance, we work outside and in trucks. We do not have a break room because upper management thinks we wouldn’t be responsible with one, and we’d just hang out inside all day not getting work done. Or…. The entity I work for is too cheap to give its maintenance employees a breakroom. Regardless, we don’t have a breakroom. What we have is a refrigerator and a microwave. In a shed.

I remembered that I had gotten a big tub of plasticware a few years ago when oddly enough I had people over for a party. I’m deeply introverted. I found the tub of plasticware under my kitchen sink. It was mostly knives and spoons, but there were a few forks as well. “Aha!” I thought. “My hoarding tendencies have served me well.” I brought the plasticware into work the next day. Forks for everyone! Then I paused. Where to put it? We didn’t have any drawers or cabinets. My eyes landed on the freezer. Perfect. They’ll be kept clean and won’t take up valuable real estate in the refrigerator.  Frozen forks have been a boon now that my fork buddy was moved to a different location. Sad day.