I found a fork in Mark’s truck. I was taking an umbrella out of the passenger door pocket, and there it was.

It wasn’t one of our forks, which were a mishmash of styles from both of our lives. It wasn’t a restaurant fork, which is typically inexpensive because so many are lost to take-home boxes and floors.

This was a heavy fork with a name stamped on the back—the type gifted as a place setting by a rich relative, or just one given by a friend because of the price. Writing and receiving those thank you notes is fun: “Thank you for the fork. We are sure one of us will love eating with it.”

You might as well write: “Yep, I have to write this because my Mama said I had to, but thanks for whatever you gave us. We have no clue. Love ya.”

Of course, I did what any wife would do: I brought the fork inside, placed it on the kitchen table, took a photo with my phone, and enlarged the back so I could read the stamped brand name: Oneida. I Googled it, and while it wasn’t ridiculously expensive, it wasn’t our Wally World silver-ish ware.

I have never been a jealous person…until Mark. Now my green-eyed imagination spins whenever we are out, my head on a swivel to see who is checking him out. He is a handsome hunk of a man, my first and only husband, and Imma keep him.

Someone with a nice fork was apparently eating food in HIS truck, in MY seat. Grrrr.

I started piecing together all the times we said he was at Lowe’s, Walmart, or Kroger. How long was a reasonable time for him to be there?

And what about that time when he said he was looking for some thingamajig to fix something in the house, car, or camper and had to go to three different places?

And he didn’t come home with anything, saying that nobody had that whatchamacallit in stock.

The rest of the evening, I fell quiet. Even though we are barely into our third blissful year of marriage, Mark has learned that when I get quiet, DO. NOT. POKE. THE. BEAR. I am not a confrontational person, and in my 60-plus years, I have thankfully learned, by the pure grace of God, to keep my mouth shut until I can sort out my emotions. Words are something you cannot take back. I stayed silent.

He knew what was bothering me because I had asked him about the fork. He said again that he had no idea where it came from or why it was there.

Hmmm.

The rest of the night, I was quiet. I cooked food I wasn’t going to eat, listened to the George Michael/Elton John channel on Pandora (loudly) with my AirPods, and made sure not to look up when Mark came into the kitchen.

Tension was thick. The offending fork remained on the kitchen table. Mocking me.

He went to bed, and I later joined him, turning my back to him. He rubbed my back, as he always does each night, and I made sure not to make the usual happy sounds, even though it still felt pretty good. I curled up into a ball and scooted over as far to the edge of the bed as I could. I honestly thought I was going to fall off during the night, but I definitely wasn’t going to move back toward the middle. Nope.

.I silently began to pray. I needed answers—wisdom, discernment, and…answers. I prayed for God to take every thought captive, especially when my mind kept circling back to what-ifs.

But, I got some nudges back:

“Have you had an indication in your past two and a half years that he would lie to you?”

No, he has been wonderful, and I am thankful for him every day.

“Who brought you together?”

Yep, that would be you Lord. Sir…

“Do you trust Me?”

Yes. Sir.

I asked for peace, and I went to sleep.

My sweet husband didn’t sleep much. The next morning, he asked to talk to me and reiterated that he had no idea where the fork came from. I told him I didn’t care. It was fine because God said it was fine. I might’ve stretched that forgiveness thing a little, but I was trying.

Later that morning, Mark visited our camper to get it ready for an upcoming trip.

He sent me a picture of two other identical Oneida forks, both in our camper.

He asked me if I remembered when we stopped for take-out food on our last camping trip? I had forgotten to grab a fork. Didn’t I get a fork out of the camper?

Uh, maybe. Uh…yeah. Sorry, Sweet Husband O’Mine…It was my fork. And although I don’t remember where it came from, we did have some group meals with other campers.

Ugh.

Humility. I believe the Lord threw me under the bus! And if anyone is missing a couple of forks, the good kind, we got ‘em.

And I got a good one too.

2 Corinthians 10:5: “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”