For the Love of Eggs

I think eggs are beautiful.

Bird eggs, specifically. {Snake eggs give me the heebie jeebies...too soft and elongated....bleck!}

I love the gentle shape of birds' eggs. I love their milky colors. I love their hard shells.

Brown, white, cream, peach, blue, green. Speckled.

Visually, they're perfect. At least to me.

That's not to say that I can't appreciate the taste of an egg. I'm an omnivore, after all. {But puulease keep those hard boiled abominations away from me!}

Yes, I do eat them, but this is about my appreciation for their outer beauty.

I love to run my fingers over their sides. To feel the weight of them in my hands.

They make me happy.

And have you heard of the Tinamou?

Tinamous are from Mexico, Central America, and South America. They're plain birds - brown/gray/tan, ground-dwelling creatures with trim, little bodies.

Nothing to write home about, at least not in my bird-judgin' opinion.

But don't let the bland plumage fool you. Tinamous lay the most gorgeous eggs. Ever. EVER.

Deeply colored and glossy, they come in a myriad of colors: turquoise to pink to aubergine to slate to dusty rose. They're coated in a porcelain-like shell that gives them the look of carved and varnished stones.

I've never seen these eggs in person, but I guarantee if I did, my heart would flutter.

In fact, I had an egg-induced flutter moment the other day at a friend's house.

They've got a coop and run in their back yard, and those three hens of theirs produce more eggs than they can handle.

Several had already been laid, but we waited patiently while one slow-moving old biddy took her sweet, sweet time finishing up. We'd crack the door to the nesting box and she'd squint her dark eyes at us, as if to say, 'Seriously? Have you no shame?'

We did not. And we checked back every few minutes until she begrudgingly retreated to her roost.

That night I made a spinach, garlic, and mozzerella frittata with those eight lovely eggs. They tasted soooo much better than store-bought {at least in my imagination}.

Even if it was a little sad to crack 'em open.

Oh, for the love of eggs.