What’s Up With Eggs?

When I think of a chicken I think about the weirdness of the neck movements, and the croaking sounds that they make in a yard with each other. They are reptiles with feather coats and awful beaks. They are soul-less. I both love and hate chickens.

All hard-boiled eggs subconsciously remind me of the time my mom made hard-boiled eggs for Holly and I on Easter. We were seven. Instead of painting them, we tried to eat as many as we could. I don’t remember the number we got up to because this memory confuses with the memory of a Jackass episode– where Preston Lacey and a girl I’ve never seen before eat hard-boiled eggs until they vomit all over the grass. I do remember Holly’s face, looking suddenly surprised and disgusted, in pain. Then immediately I experienced pain too, coming from my esophagus(?) probably as a result of the dryness. My mom was laughing at the kitchen counter, I think. Holly and I ran to the sink, shovelling water into our mouths. There is both a positive and negative association with hard-boiled eggs, in my mind, but I think the positive ultimately outweighs the negative.

I can’t think of anything else that is comparable to an egg.

Sometimes I feel disgusted by myself and by the chicken when I am eating an egg.

Once I watched a YouTube video of a chicken laying an egg and could not help but clench my genitals in horror. It reminded me of the Diva Cup. Yet this did not negate my love for eating eggs, in fact, it may have only it accelerated it. Conceptually, I often feel that I am ingesting special powers from eggs, like how a calvary commander might eat a human sacrifice before war.

One time when I was standing in front of Union Station in Toronto, I peeled a hard-boiled egg and a man walked by me and said, “Are you eating a hard-boiled egg?”

And I said, “Yes,”

And he said, “That’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen.”

And then I just laughed because I didn’t know what to say.

I don’ know. When I was flirting with the idea of veganism I convinced myself that eggs were repulsive, which was not really hard to accomplish. I was interested in maintaing a plant-based diet because I felt that plant cells were superior to animal cells, and that it was generally “cleaner” for my body, but really, I think that I’m sometimes bloodthirsty and honestly crave the savagery (/vitamins?) For example, up north, at this time of year, in -30C weather, I often fantasized about eating the body of a majestic animal, like a moose or a seal.

When I eat hard-boiled eggs I don’t feel human and that’s a good thing. It takes me out of my element a little bit, I guess. It makes me think about food chains and domination. Eggs might even be my favourite food. It makes me feel like I’m eating a piece of art or a precious jewel.

There is a big difference between organic and non-organic eggs, from what I’ve been told. The yolk in organic eggs are almost always dark gold, even orange. Organic eggs taste a bit musky to me but it may be an illusion. If I had two mysterious eggs in front of me, and I had to guess which one was organic and which one was not, I’m not sure I would be able to do it. I suppose organic eggs do taste more robust and iron-rich, if I really think about it. Whereas non-organic eggs maintain more of that shallow, sulphuric taste, I think. I buy organic free-range eggs, not because of the way they taste, but because of the way they are collected and sold. I don’t really believe anything though, to be honest. There is a farmer who comes to my mom’s office sometimes and she used to buy eggs from him. Lately she’s been buying eggs from superstores in the States :( and they come in yellow styrofoam packages and it’s so sad.

Pregnant women are discouraged from eating eggs unless them are scrambled. My guess is that in the future– let’s say 10-20-30 years, no one will eat eggs. They won’t even be available for purchase. But artificial eggs? Probably yes. You probably won’t even be able to tell the difference between authentic and synthetic.

That is how I feel about eggs. Thank you.