It was quite arresting, decades ago, when a young artist in New York City told me that, despite appearances -- she came across as confident and hopeful -- she felt inside herself as if she were an egg that had been hurled against the wall, broken in a hundred pieces and dripping down the white paint. In other words, she was "Shattered" (Rolling Stones, 1978). But you never would have known. Not in a thousand years.

Gosh, I learned something that day.

This cast describes the human condition as more serious than we sometimes imagine -- maybe than we ever imagine. At least until it happens to us!

ABBA makes a fresh appearance, via the refrain to "S.O.S."; and Rudyard Kipling, too. T. S. Eliot wrote once that some of Kipling's short stories feel divinely inspired. "On the Gate" may be one of them. You decide.

Dear Egg Hurled Against the Kitchen Wall: