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Thursday 19 March 2009

Equinox, Eggs & Balance

Tomorrow is the first day of Spring... Autumn, for those of you in the southern hemisphere. Yay!

Friday, March 20th we will be celebrating the Vernal equinox in Northern Hemisphere and Autumnal Equinox in the Southern Hemisphere. There is a folk tale that claims only on the Vernal and Autumnal Equinox, one can balance an egg on its end. Well last Fall on the Autumnal Equinox, I did the egg experiment and to my surprise... it worked!

The truth is you can perfectly balance an egg any day of the year. Here is the history behind the significance of the ritual on the equinoxes:

The Chinese are thought to have originated the practice of standing eggs on end during the equinox. Just as the equinox symbolically restores balance to the world by signaling its rebirth after a season of darkness, the equinox literally balances the day by dividing it into equal portions of darkness and light. If the symbol of fertility — eggs — could be balanced on end during a day equally divided between day and night, this was a sign that all nature was in harmony. That the balancing of eggs could be achieved on any day of the year was of no importance; what everyone wanted and needed was a familiar, reassuring ritual to demonstrate that all was right with the world.

I thought I would just give you all a little heads-up so you could try the egg balance for yourself. Give me a shout and let me know how it worked out for you.

8 comments:

TopHat said...

Ooh! I like the idea of everything getting back to balance.

Lee said...

Perfect, my word for 2009 is Balance. I'll let this percolate overnight and see what I come up with to celebrate it tomorrow!

Shadow said...

ha! balance an egg... you gotta be kidding me, i can't even balance a box, heee heee heeee. happy spring to you!!! i'm watching yellow leaves blow across the street in preparating for the season of rest

cheatymoon said...

I remember when you did this last fall! Happy equinox to you too, Jack.

koreen (aka: winn) said...

Interesting thought... never tried it. Happy equinox!

kayerj said...

I'll try it today and tomorrow

LarryG said...

a good reminder that life is a remarkable balancing act!

Jack said...

I'm just wondering how many tried to balance an egg today. I had my nieces here and gave them each an egg and they both got the egg to balance :)