Cheesy Adventure

You know what kind of adventures I love the most? The unexpected kind—the kind that spring up on you without solicitation or invitation. It was a filled day and a full day—do you know the difference?
I began with a trip to a flea market which turned into a lunch date with a friend. After taking her home, I came home to write while I waited out the several hours in between my next friend excursion to Cracker Barrel. About an hour into my writing session, I got a call from a friend asking if I wanted to go on an adventure. I thought about saying no-—after all, I was on a roll writing. But I’ve promised myself to never say “no” to an adventure. A writer must fill up in order to spill out. So I asked when she’d be by, yanked on some suitable clothes, and we were off.
The adventure turned out to be a trip to a cheese shop, which, by nature, was also a wine shop. When we walked up to the cheese case, I fingered the colorfully rinded cheeses, asking dubiously, “What’s the green stuff in it?” Mold, was the answer, of course. But I’m not a cheese connoisseur so how was I to know?
Standing there reading all the names that I couldn’t pronounce, I was astounded at the selection and the realization that I never even knew that most of those cheeses existed. I’ve never ventured very far from American and cheddar; I don’t even like Swiss. In fact, Feta has been the most exotic that I’ve tried. According to cheese.com, there are 670 kinds of recorded cheese in the world. Which makes sense, because I suppose every culture in the world has a cheese. (What must a cheeseless culture be like?) My cheesy ignorance made me feel very tiny, made the world feel very big. But it didn’t overwhelm or discourage me; it made me want to discover more of the world and its cheese.
My friend and I dined on brie and pate on freshly baked French bread; we ate spiced olives, deviled eggs, and little chocolate glazed crescent desserts in the back seat of her car. The impromptu picnic and my newfound knowledge left me feeling spoiled, enriched, and—dare I say it?—broadened.