Oblivion_ stories - By David Foster Wallace Page 0,107

or resolution was going to be impossible unless there was at least some slight mutuality about our willingness to concede, pace the information of our senses, at least the ‘theoretical possibility’ that we might be wrong about just who was asleep and dreaming and\or ‘snoring’ and who was not.)

Also, by this point in time, our routine (or, ‘ritual’) for preparing to retire and go to sleep in the bedroom had also often become almost indescribably tense and unpleasant. Hope often would not acknowledge or speak to me, and when, from my side of the room, I ‘caught her eye’ as she was emerging from her clothes closet or the washroom or applying emollient at her beige enamel ‘Vanity’ ensemble’s lighted mirrors, her expression was often that of someone regarding a distasteful stranger. (Hope’s stepfather and stepsisters, Meredith and Denise [or, more familiarily, ‘Donni’], are also accomplished at this expression, as I first noted upon my first or initial introduction to her family, which occurred at a dinner at Dr. Sipe and his wife’s large, Victorian style home in the historical ‘Fourth Ward’ district of West Newark, in the course of which, at two different points, ‘Father’ asked me some type of personal or biographical question and then, in the midst of my attempt to reply, interrupted in order to publicly indicate that he was becoming impatient or wished that I would ‘Cut to the chase’ in a blunter or apparently more time efficient way.) Often, by the time the bedroom’s lights are now extinguished, I will have become so over-wrought and tense that any likely prospect of falling asleep in the near future vanished altogether, despite the fact that I was often now so exhausted as to literally tremble and my vision, as mentioned, regularly went in and out of different states of exaggerated focus, depth and abstract flux or ‘retroussage’—for instance, the way Audrey Bogen’s once fresh, voluptuous and innocent face seemed to tremble or shudder on the edge of exploding into abstract shards when she brought Dr. Sipe’s ash-tray, which was formed of heavy, black glass and emblazoned with the Raritan Club’s heraldic crest and Latin motto—‘Resurgam!’—in virid red.

As well, of course, as the fact that the absurd ephemeracy, triviality and obvious displacement or projection of the whole ‘snoring’ conflict—of which, between Hope and myself, only I seemed truly aware or frustrated at the absurdity and irrelevance of the whole conflict—made it that much worse. I myself simply could not believe that Hope and myself’s relationship at this crucial, ‘Empty nest’ point in our marriage could founder on such a trivial issue, one which, even in far less happy or viable unions than our own, must, for the most part, be resolved or ‘worked through’ rather early on. Like conflicts concerning, for instance, partners’ differing communicative ‘styles,’ amounts of time spent together as opposed to physically apart, division of responsibilities for household tasks and so forth, mutual compatibility of sleeping ‘styles’ and arrangements is simply part of the domestic compromise of living with a spouse, as, of course, almost every man of any worldly experience knows. I could not, for several weeks or even months, even bring myself to raise the issue of the conflict with personal friends or family. It simply seemed too silly to credit. I even went so far as to try consulting or ‘seeing’ a professional Couple counselor—again, an action undertaken on my own and, as it were, ‘sub-rosa,’ as I knew quite well Hope’s, her stepfather’s, and the bulk of her true and adoptive family’s (with the exception of Vivian, whose allegedly ‘Recovered’ memories and hysterical public accusations at the extended family’s Holiday get-together at Paul and Theresa’s extraordinary vacation home off the Manasquan inlet had led to herself and Hope’s ‘falling out’ and to the entire extended family’s unspoken prohibition of any mention of the entire subject, besides which were Dr. Sipe’s own sentiments respecting the issue of ‘therapy’’s eligibility as a Medical expense for the purposes of Health Care plans and ‘Managed Care,’ which were well known and vociferous) feelings vis à vis the ‘therapy’ issue, and knew also, by that point, that Hope’s flat, tight-mouthed refusal, were I to broach the issue, even to consider ‘seeing’ the counselor with me as a ‘couple’ would frustrate and aggravate me all over again, and simply escalate or further the scope of the marital conflict—only, there-upon, to my considerable chagrin, to repeatedly have, suffer or endure a series of ‘therapeutic’ exchanges such as,