The Memory Inside an Egg

Some memories arrive quietly — not through dreams, not through grief, but through the smallest, most ordinary moments.

This morning, Kenzo asked for egg soldiers for breakfast. Just a simple request, something he’s said so many times before… but the moment the words left his mouth, something inside me shifted.
A warmth. A sting.
A memory.

Suddenly I was back in that moment with Vic — the day he asked me how to make egg soldiers the exact way Kenzo liked them.
He had already tried so many times on his own.
And Kenzo kept telling him gently, with that matter-of-fact honesty kids have,
“Dad, that’s not how Mum makes it.”

I remember the way Vic looked at me then — a mix of frustration, determination, and genuine love. He wanted to get it right for his son. Not just close enough. Not his own version.
He wanted to make it exactly the way Kenzo loved it.

I talked him through everything step by step:

• letting the eggs sit out until they reached room temperature
• bringing the pot of water to a steady boil
• gently lowering the eggs in with a ladle
• setting the timer for exactly four minutes
• lifting them out right away
• and cooling them briefly in an ice bath to stop the cooking

It was such a small thing — eggs, timing, boiling water — but Vic took it in so sincerely.
So wholeheartedly.
Because for him, making Kenzo happy was never a chore.
It was the point of everything.

Now it feels like that moment belongs to another lifetime.
A simpler time.
A time when all three of us were still moving through the world together in our imperfect, complicated way.

And today, as I cracked the soft-boiled eggs and sliced the toast into careful strips, I could feel that older version of us lingering in the air — the echo of Vic trying, learning, wanting to show love in the ways he knew how.

Every time Kenzo asks for egg soldiers now, my mind goes back there automatically.
Not in a painful way.
Not even in a sad way.
But in a way that reminds me of how deeply Vic adored his son — enough to memorize a recipe that only mattered because Kenzo loved it.

It’s strange how grief hides in the smallest corners of everyday life.
In food.
In routines.
In tiny details that no one else would think twice about.

But maybe that’s also where love hides too.
In egg soldiers.
In four-minute timers.
In all the little things that once seemed ordinary — until they became the things that hold our memories together.