My mum--a nutritionist, a flabbergasting vegan concocter, and a dear spiritual sister--shared with me once that the vegan who eats an egg is severely affected by the foreign cholesterol agent and suffers from it, whereas to the regular egg-muncher, one more egg is simply that--a tasty breakfast snack that certainly does not assist the HDL happy cholesterols in their battle, but certainly does not overdiscourage them since they are used to such insults. As I have experienced the affect that the rare wedge of cheese has on my digestive tract, it seems fairly likely.
In my modern literature class, we have been reading a fair number of texts, apparently well-known, and equally well-admired. To be sure all of them have contained clever writing, and as a dabbler with words, I am excited by the interesting twists of grammar and pecularly delcicious expressions they contain. But what of the content? It is not simply due to the fact that I grew up without television that I am slightly wary of the innards of these tales, nor to the fact that I have not read their like before--I demolished plenty of junk food when I was little--but in these last couple of years I have found myself gradually going vegan, and simultaneously, yearning for those letters that uplift.
What has less-than-moral literature to do with eggs? All too much when we imagine it slowly lining the arteries of our brain with greese-laden images of crime and sensuality, human depravity and grotesqueness, hindering the flow of clear blood and water to the source of our reasonings. At first it seems innocent enough, the smooth, warm-brown shells and the clear goo suspending the attractive golden orb, the beautiful feel of it in your hand, the fine tapered point, the playful freckles...
But I long to cry out to my professors like St. Augustine does in Confessions: "You clash your rocks and set up a great din: 'This is the place to acquire literacy; here you will develop the eloquence essential to persuasion and argument.' Really? Could we not have learned those useful words elsewhere. . . .?" and again: "It is simply not true that such words are more conveniently learned from obscene stories of this type, though it is all too true that under the influence of the words obscene deeds are the more boldly committed" (19-20).
I will agree that it tastes good; I was a toast-and-scrambled-egg eater myself for many years and it was an effort to see the little black frypan, perfect for a single egg, languish in the cupboard. But that is not the issue. Aren't there more healthful materials to which we might subject our minds and bodies?
Marinated tofu is delightful, a true savor of life unto life--a fully satisfying and fragrant dish for all meals...
2 comments:
yay for tofu and for healthy reading too. :)
I feel your pain... in my history class we watch many of what to me are violent films and read a textbook that seems to dwell on sexual themes... Psychology class presents many "facts" that I refuse to swallow... in Biology the student is continually confronted with an evolutionary twist that, although often a ridiculous comparison to the idea of a designer, is nevertheless present. The teachers don't necessarily condone each of these things, yet we are required to learn them.
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