The Little Egg

Alex Woodard
2 min readDec 12, 2020

Today is Mother’s Day. I’m not one. I’m apparently surrounded by them, though. There are signs of new life everywhere, from baby turtles around the pond to tiny killdeer in the pasture, to eggs in the nest under the horse trailer.

I found the little egg on Easter Sunday, picking it up as gingerly as I did the dyed eggs in the backyard on my 5th Easter. I’d had to be careful that day, since my other arm was broken from an unsuccessful attempt at riding my bike with my eyes closed. With training wheels.

The little egg must have fallen from somewhere, but I couldn’t find a nook or a nest. Somehow the delicate shell had survived the impact with the pavers, but probably wouldn’t be as lucky with a trampling by dogs or horses.

I thought maybe the mama finch with the nest under the horse trailer would adopt the little egg, even though her eggs were a few times the size. I carefully cradled it in my palm and shuffled down the hill and into the pasture, where I ducked under the trailer and reached up toward the nest.

Four scraggly heads unexpectedly popped up.

And I dropped the little egg.

I wish I could say that the shell broke, and a beautiful bird, already fully formed, magically emerged and took majestic flight into the blue skies of forever.

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Alex Woodard

I ride horses and waves. Never at the same time. Music and books at alexwoodard.com