It was right after I got the call from Tanya and tracked her boyfriend down in the warehouse.  "Is your name Roy? Tanya called. She wants you to call her right away--she says it's an emergency," I told the boyfriend. He nodded his head calmly, put a couple more cans of pinto beans on to the shelf, then headed over to the recieving desk to use the phone. Shortly after I returned to the front desk the phone rang again and the man on the other line was asking about cheese.  He was talking too quickly. "Sir, are you calling for yourself or on the behalf of an agency?" I asked. He did not understand my question. He continued, "I once had this cheese that I ate and it was from the food bank. I was wondering if you know if you still have that kind of cheese?"

I was dumbfounded for a second, but continued, "I am sure the food helpline can find an agency that will meet all your dietary needs.  If you like I can transfer you to the food helpline," admittedly trying to pass the cheeseavore on to someone else. "No, no I don't take handouts from anyone. I wanted to know what kind of cheese it was then I can go out and buy it myself." I tried explaining it was impossible to track this cheese down. Besides the fact that he had no idea what type of cheese it was, the agency that served it to him could have gotten it from someplace other than us, and furthermore it might not have even been a product that we bought but it could have been donated to us from a food drive and we don't keep track of the specific items that get donated to us. After explaining all this to him I finally told him the only way I could possbly think of tracking down his cheese was by searching up his referral history and seeing what agencies he had been referred to. Then he could get another referral and once there do a little detective work.

I was a tad embarassed to be talking so extensively and seriously about cheese.  He told me no, he had never asked for help before, it was his niece. He would go over to his niece's house and she would make him a cheese sandwich and they were the best cheese sandwiches made with the best cheese. And he thought that she got the cheese from us. He now wanted to make his own cheese sandwiches but needed to know the brand of that cheese. "Sir, I am sorry but it is impossible," I said. He thanked me for my time and I wished him the best of luck on his cheese quest.

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I didn't tell him we can never get back the cheese sandwiches fom our past. I was amazed by the power and faith this man had placed in himself and the food bank. He thought that with one phone call he could find his cheese and for a few minutes there he even had me going, trying to brainstorm how to find it. Now I wonder if Remembrance of Things Past could have been written about a man searching for an unidentified cheese he had once eaten at a soup kitchen as opposed to a madeline cookie, or would that just change the whole sentiment of the story? I don't know cause the thing's too damn long to read.