The Littlest Fish (Part 1)

Today I had a moment in my car, sitting at a stoplight and staring down at my greasy whey-stained tshirt. My job is cheese. Really? I just picked a food I'm obsessed with and decided to make that my life. And that's what I do. So what do you do? Cheese. I do cheese. I had this entire what-the-hell-for real-? dialogue in my head. I suddenly realized what people I meet at weddings and innocuous functions must think to themselves when I tell them I'm a cheese intern.

All twenty seconds of this moment made me smile. The only way it could get better is if I got a side-job as an ice cream taster. What a great and fatty thing it is that I do! Was I just lucky enough to really love one of the few foods out of which I can make a life? I also love steak. I doubt I could specialize as a steak artisan (or can I?). How did I find places to work where I always, whether I take stock of it or not, leave satisfied with my day? How did I find such talented people to work with who are willing to teach me about a craft in such a way that said satisfaction comes so naturally?

It was a refreshing slap in the face in the midst of naivete-shattering realizations about the store and trying life-related issues, which have made me a bit blue this fall. The west coast happened to catch me just as fang-toothed obstacles have started to skulk about on Cheesy Street. I still love my day-to-day life and the people I work with just as much as I did this summer. I'm just as fulfilled with my place in the world as I ever was. Today, I woke back up to that part of myself a little bit.

Like a child, I often have ideas, and daydreams, and hopeful pictures painted in my head of excitement, and adventure, and the way things should be, all of which I like to keep intact. Practical matters, panic, and homesickness will always threaten to poop on my dreams. To survive, I have to focus a little more on the joy of what I do and the company I keep, and a little less on abstract future what-ifs that scare me.

I have to think more about opportunities like last Wednesday, when I had to pretend to be a big deal...