if you want to see beautiful fried eggs ..

another fine morning. for me, at least, as far as i am concerned.

 it  was my rest day from work and i got up early ahead of my wife and daughter. i thought it best to impress them this time so i prepared breakfast.  went to the bakery  and bought freshly baked bread.  back at home, i fried the leftover rice, cut several bean curd squares for me and fried them as well to a crisp golden brown.  fixed the dip for these -- two spoonfuls of vinegar, one spoonful of soy sauce, and a pinch of sugar.  for my two ladies, i knew they'd be okay with eggs fried sunny side up.

after i was done arranging the breakfast table, i proudly announced, "wake up, guys! breakfast's ready." the two ladies still looked drowsy as they sat.  the wife smiled thankfully at my initiative.  the daughter eyed my handiwork as chef.  after a short prayer of thanks to the Infinite, we started eating.

"what are these, dad?" the daughter smilingly asked.
"why, they are fried eggs, your favorite, sunny side up!" i boasted.
"hmmm, doesn't look like that to me," daughter said critically, "looks more like a cross between crepes or scrambled eggs."

i looked at the eggs again. i must admit she was right.  there was a side up but by no means was that sunny.  i knew what she meant. a sunny side up fried egg should look like two concentric circles, a big white one and a smaller yellow one right smack in the middle of the big white one.  the ones i did were not even close to a circle.  the edges were crisp and brown and overcooked like curled bacon when fried, the yellow was smudged over the white (i knew this happened when i struggled to turn over the eggs).  they were actually semi-circle or half-circle fried eggs.  well, immediately, that novice chef inside of me found these words of wisdom for my defense --

"daughter, if you want to see beautiful fried eggs you have to wake up early and do them yourself."  that said, i took a mouthful of the fried rice and the golden brown bean curd and coaxed my two ladies to try the bean curd and the amazing chinese-style dip i made.  i can only sense mysterious glances being exchanged between my two ladies.

now, i think there is really some nugget of wisdom from what i told my daughter over breakfast -- daughter, if you want to see beautiful fried eggs you have to wake up early and do them yourself.  

we must admit, for us all, most times, we rely on what others do, to get benefit from their skills -- cooking, farming, fishing, carpentry, singing, painting, accounting, laundering, etc.  this is because it is difficult to be a jack-of-all-trades. many times, though, even without any solicitation, we give our critiques or comments which are generally negative and full of dissatisfaction.  that is, without having made even a small effort to give thanks first for the service or services we received. 

i believe, in these instances where you are dissatisfied with a service you are getting, then the best thing is to learn the skill yourself, and do it yourself. in this case, one will be able to expend all efforts to realize that benchmark or ideal that one is seeing in his mind's eye. 

in our mind's eye, we always have this benchmark, this image, of how things need to be done. we use this to pass out judgments or critiques. we fail to realize that the ones doing the work have their own benchmarks or ideals as well that they tend to comply with. now, their benchmarks or ideals might not be the same as ours.  most importantly, they are doing these, sharing their expertise or skills, as a form of service.  even if we pay them, still, in general their sharing of their skills is a service to those who lack those skills.

and so,

we cannot let others exercise for us, if we want to have that toned body we want; we cannot let others sing that song the way we wanted it sung; the way we are hearing it inside our heads;  we cannot let others meditate for us and anticipate cosmic consciousness to dawn on us ..

we have to fry the eggs ourselves so we can get that satisfaction from that sunny side-up image we have conjured in our mind's eyes.