Russian Poulette

It’s all fine and good to say we let our chickens run free because we want them to have a happy life…and they do.  But someone forgot to think about the treacherousness, the lying-in-wait nastiness, the absolute noxiousness of the forgotten egg. 

We bought six egg layers this summer.  Little red hens. So our grandsons would have something to do when they came out to the farm.  When I asked the farmer, “Where are you housing these chickens”, he said, “I’ll just let them run free and the kids can hunt for the eggs”.  Oh, so cute, I thought.  That will be fun.  And it was.  The kids came out on the weekend, trundled off to the barn and with the farmer’s help found at least four separate hiding places where these secretive little hens had cloistered at least four to six eggs.  As we were about to leave the barn, our son noticed a hidden cache of eggs behind an old piece of wood.  Twelve, thirteen eggs were piled amidst straw and a few raggedy feathers.  Ohhh.  I wonder how long these have been here?  And therein lies the farmer’s dilemma.  Actually, the farmer’s wife’s dilemma.  Cause you gotta know the farmer won’t be crackin’ these babies anytime soon.

The farmer said, “They’ll be fine”.   And I said, “Uhuh” and rolled my eyes while the grandsons gloried in the mother lodeness of their discovery.  I do a lot of eye rolling on the farm. 

Well, there they are, all washed up nicely and looking quite innocent.  I’ve placed them in a big bowl, separate from the um…..fresh eggs and in the fridge they go.  Now comes the dangerous part.  When I need an egg, I will break each one in a saucer – outside -  while pinching my nostrils with one hand.  It will be quite the maneuver, going right along with the eye rolling feat.  No way of knowing until that egg hits the dish, if it’s fresh or, heaven forbid, rotten to the yolk!  And if you’ve never smelled a rotten egg, I cannot even begin to tell you the absolute putrid smell that will envelop you and everything in the surrounding area for at least two, maybe three kilometers wide.

Here’s the thing.  If only those food lab people had invented a chicken who laid “best before” eggs.  Wouldn’t that be phenomenal?  Every little brown egg would be date stamped or bar coded and we’d know exactly which ones to toss in the manure pile.  But no, oh no, farmer’s wives have to have our challenges, our stressors, just like everyone else.  So, tomorrow morning, picture me outside on the deck, egg in one hand, nostrils pinched with the other.  Playing Russian poulette.  And we’ll see how my day goes on from there.