… aside from being a genius—and perhaps this even served as the stimulus for his being one—was incredibly curious. He said so himself:

I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.
~ Albert Einstein

I grew up hearing the old adage, Curiosity killed the cat. But I think now that this might hold true only for things that (cough, cough) one perhaps has no business being curious about. But curiosity, in and of itself, is I believe a wonderful thing. For doesn’t every amazing quest for knowledge begin with a questioning mind?

A big part of curiosity is wanting to see beyond the surface, searching for the unusual in the commonplace, seeking the extraordinary in the ordinary. (And funnily, at the end of that road is often the discovery of miracles that, far from being rare and few and far between, are actually unfolding every day right under our noses, if we but choose to really see).

All of which brings us to my contribution to this week’s WordPress Photo of the Week challenge, with the theme Unusual:

{ Click on the image for a larger view}

Edward Weston said, Anything that excites me for any reason, I will photograph; not searching for unusual subject matter, but making the commonplace unusual.

I love that. I have always been a firm believer in searching for the special qualities that lie underneath what we otherwise take for granted as ordinary and mundane.

What does the image above look like to you? To me, it looked like some alien creature’s double-tongue helping itself to a taste of tree sap. What it actually is: sliced strawberries surrounded by crystallized and caramelized sugar. Unusual-looking but really just your usual everyday stuff that goes by the name dessert. Ordinary yet extraordinary. (Awesome tasting, too! :D)

So to my dear extra-special friends, here’s to an incredibly extraordinary day filled with curiosity that brings happy surprises to your doorstep!