Hillbilly Elegy

encounters with our family.
Given the state of Mom and Matt’s
relationship, I was surprised when I
came home from school one day early
during my sophomore year and Mom
announced that she was getting married.
Perhaps, I thought, things weren’t quite
as bad as I expected. “I honestly thought
you and Matt were going to break up,” I
said. “You fight every day.” “Well,” she
replied, “I’m not getting married to
him.”
It was a story that even I found
incredible. Mom had been working as a
nurse at a local dialysis center, a job
she’d held for a few months. Her boss,
about ten years her senior, asked her out