David Wallace - Oblivion

At this juncture, the Somnologist — knowing, as he did, only the bare outline or ‘skeleton’ of the unprecedented marital discord which the alleged ‘snoring’ issue which had brought us to his Memorial Clinic had precipitated between Hope and myself, and evidently misapprehending my somnolent or dolorous cast of countenance as ambivalence or an insouciant passivity or ‘apathy’ (Hope’s own mien, meanwhile, had gone ominously rigid or ‘hard’ in the face of this sudden apparent diagnostic ‘volte face’ or reversal and the M.D.’s evident vindication of my own long held claims that the specific episodes of ‘snoring’ which had so aggrieved her were, strictly speaking, in fact the ‘unreal’ products of either a dream or the ‘loosened associations’ of nocturnal or oneiric ‘Night terrors,’ precisely as I had claimed repetitively throughout the previous cold weather months’ traumatic and devitalizing conflict, the vessels and tendons in her neck flaring involuntarily and her narrow, somewhat lupine and leathery face’s every line, fissure, wrinkle, seam, pleat, lesion, pouch or ‘flaw’ standing out as if starkly high-lighted in the muscular rigidity of her expression; she looked, for a moment, literally decades above and beyond her true age, and I could well imagine the oblivious or unwilled affront which our Audrey’s own ‘dewy’ or epithelial complexion must have presented to Hope before her banishment out-of-State, Audrey comprising an, as it were, walking compendium of all the daughterly charms Hope so feared acknowledging were now ‘behind’ her. [See, for instance, the prior early Spring’s ‘Elective’ or ‘non-essential’ and hence uncovered out-patient procedure to have the Varicose veins removed or erased from the rear of her bottom and legs’ upper portion, her convalescence from which was plainly so rebarbative and, frankly, sad or pathetic in its impotent vanity and, as it were, ‘denial’ of what had, in fact, long ceased to make any substantive difference. ( “not start this again my” )]), now felt absently or ‘unconsciously’ at his forehead’s keratoses, and — in yet still another apparent, confusing or ‘paradoxical’ diagnostic reversal ( pace his phlegmatic or sanguine demeanor, the Somnologist’s ‘bed side manner’ left something to be desired, Hope and I had both agreed) — averred (meaning, the Sleep specialist now averred) that, yes, technically speaking, my wife’s accusations as to ‘snoring,’ while based on (in his terms) ‘interior, dreamed experience’ as opposed to ‘exterior sensory input,’ nonetheless were, in a Medical or scientific sense, ‘technically’ correct. With the large collection or ‘ring’ of insulated keys now in his left hand, and addressing some type of facial signal or ‘cue’ to the nubile technician, the neutrally objective Somnologist stated that the ‘low’ or Infra-red light videotape of two such ‘Fourth-’ or ‘Paradoxical’ sleep stage intervals immediately prior to Hope’s loud accusations of my ‘snoring’ would, he said, confirm that I myself had indeed, within these intervals, been engaged in the ‘occluded’ or, more formally, ‘nasopharyngeal’ respiration commonly referred to among the lay populace as ‘snoring,’ this being a transient or recurrent phenomenon or condition often common to males over 40 or more, Dr. Paphian explained — particularly in those whose nocturnal posture was, by habit (like myself ’s), supine as opposed to prone, lateral or ‘foetal’—and occurring predominantly in human sleep’s medial or ‘deep’ stages Two and Three of sleep. Apparently, however, the ‘Fourth-’ or ‘Paradoxical’ stage’s paralysis of certain key laryngeal muscle groups rendered actual ‘snoring’ as or while one actively dreamt during R.E.M.- or ‘dream’ sleep physiologically impossible. All the Sleep specialist’s information was concise and bore directly on the matter at hand. My wife, meanwhile, was massaging her temples in order to signify stress or impatience. The Conference room’s somewhat subordinate or ‘junior’ aide to the Somnologist’s Sleep team — a roughly college age young man (or, in today’s more popular nomenclature, ‘Dude’) who wore, beneath his unbuttoned and not altogether spotless or sterile ‘lab’ coat, a pink, faded, red or fuchsia cotton ‘tee’ shirt on whose front appeared the line drawing or caricature of a nameless but somehow ‘naggingly’ familiar or famous person’s stymied or confused looking face, below which, on the garment’s fabric, appeared the statement or caption, ‘MY WIFE SAYS I’M INDECISIVE, BUT I’M NOT SO SURE,’which was almost certainly not meant to be taken seriously or at ‘face’ value but was, rather, some form of droll or ironic sally — now returned from his brief hiatus from the Conference room with a small, boxed set of ordinary or ‘commercial’ VHS type videotapes, which were labeled in black, felt tip ink, ‘R.N.’ and ‘H.S.-N.,’ along with Hope and myself’s respective P.P.O. and D.M.C. ‘Patient codes’ and the dates of the relevant Wednesday nights during which the actual filmed sleep ‘experiments’ had been held or conducted; and this youth and the ( “only hurt a tiny” ) Somnologist conferred together over a brushed steel or aluminum Medical chart holder respecting precisely which tape to ‘load’ and\or ‘cue’ in order to empirically verify the Somnologist’s diagnosis of Hope’s accusations’ ultimately unreal, oneiric or ‘Paradoxical’ content. Hope, at this point, leaning once more slightly forward and furiously twitching or ‘joggling’ one high heeled shoe of her crossed legs, posited or inquired whether, from the sum total of the Clinic’s diagnostic data, it might be thus possible that ‘he’ (meaning, I myself) could somehow be deeply asleep and ‘snoring’ in the Sleep chamber’s bed and yet could simultaneously be dreaming the precise ‘sensation’ or ‘experience’ of being still somehow, as it were, still fully ‘awake’ in the narrow, firmly reinforced Clinic bed, a possibility which (Hope suggested) would account for my sincere or heartfelt ‘denials’ of having been asleep whenever she finally ‘[couldn’t] stand it’ and cried aloud in order to wake me — to which, interjecting somewhat irritatedly in response, I myself pointed out the obvious ‘hole’ or logical flaw in Hope’s theory’s scenario, and asked the Somnologist to stipulate once again, for, as it were, the ‘record,’ that, according to his explanations respecting the well known stages of human sleep, I physically could not be ‘snoring’ when ( “dreaming” ) dreaming, since, by basic logic, if I were, a., literally ‘dreaming’ that I was awake, I would, b., be, by definition, in the ‘Fourth-’ or ‘Paradoxical’ stage of sleep, and thus, c., due to the ‘Paradoxical’ stage’s well known laryngeal paralysis, I could, d., not be producing the rasping, gurgling or ‘nasopharyngeal’ snoring sounds which in fact Hope had herself in reality only dreamt that she’d heard me producing in situ. Both Hope’s shoes, gloves and expensive purse or hand bag matched perfectly in regards to color and constituent leather texture; she also always smelled quite fine. It was in or around this point that the lissome, mature, voluptuous but somewhat severe or ‘forbidding’ technician began to insert or ‘load’ a given, selected videotape in to a receptacle or ‘slot’ or ‘hole’ in the Monitor’s rear, and — utilizing a sheet of coded ( “Please!” ) Somnological data and the hand-held remote — to begin to ‘cue’ the ‘low’ light recording to the relevant stage Four or ‘Paradoxical’ interval just prior to (one would presume, based on the Sleep specialist’s ‘prolegomenon’ or gloss [physiologically, I myself still remained ‘At attention,’ one might say]) a sudden, aggrieved and high volume accusation of ‘snoring’ on my wife’s part.