Once in a while, you read something that just sticks with you. Recently there was “What He Took” by Kelly Grey Carlisle.

Now here’s something else: a powerful essay by Elissa Altman of PoorMansFeast. An excerpt:

And then she made eggs.

A lot of eggs.

At first, when things were still good and happy, they were soft boiled, and sat in the broad end of our porcelain egg cups, their tips sliced away so that my father and I — perched side by side at the breakfast counter half an hour before he dropped me off at the school bus stop on his way to the subway — could dunk untoasted fingers of Pepperidge Farm Diet White into the runny yolk. As my parents’ marriage wore on and she grew angrier, the eggs were medium boiled, their firm yolks like thick golden velvet, with spots of remaining tenderness just barely discernible.

When I turned fourteen, my mother began hard boiling our eggs; she’d put them in a small pot filled with a shallow inch or two of water, set them on the stove, crank up the flame, and walk away. Eventually, they’d explode, their snow white glair erupting like Vesuvius through the fissures of her discontent. I’d refuse to eat them at that point, and when she came back into the kitchen, she’d grab the black plastic handle of the pot and dump its contents — the water had long since evaporated — directly into the trash.

My parents divorced the following year.

For the full essay, click here.