Shiloh: The Battlefield of Marriage

In “Shiloh” an injured truck driver sees his incapacity as a chance to start anew with his wife after twenty years of barely seeing each other and the death of their son. His attempts at this renewal of their love and the reinforcement of their marriage are feeble at best and have little to no positive affect on their relationship. Shiloh, as the sight of their inevitable breakup, is ironic because in the sight of a long-ago battle the war that was their marriage. As Pat Benatar once said “Love is a Battlefield,” and this theme is very prevalent in the progression of Leroy’s relationship with Norma Jean. His meager attempts to reintroduce himself into normal life are failures, his fixation on crafts leads to strange Popsicle stick houses and a Star Trek pillowcase. It is obvious from Leroy’s observations as well as Norma Jean’s behavior that she enjoyed her life when he was on the road and rarely home. After the death of their son they lose their connection and stop communicating their problems to each other.

Norma Jean is stuck in her life when she was nineteen and her son died. She is constantly relying on her mother and seems as though she is a teenage girl when she is actually almost forty. When her mother catches her smoking she reacts like a teenager instead of a responsible adult. The fact that she was hiding it is evidence enough that she was not acting as an adult; no adult need hide their smoking from their parents. When Mabel mentions the baby who was killed by “datsun” and mentions neglect Norma reacts with the angry response that is characteristic in teenagers. She dwells on her mother’s word as if it were law, the way in which a teenager takes their parents literally and as the final word in everything. Her insecurities mixed with the time she is forced to spend with her husband opens her eyes to the fact that maybe she and Leroy got married hastily after he got her pregnant. They, like the Dases, married almost immediately out of highschool and for all the wrong reasons.

Leroy is a very simple man who does not notice the plight of his wife and blindly strives for a rebirth of their marriage. He does not realize that Norma Jean is unhappy and even though he seems to notice that she does not seem to be happy that he is at home again he does not see a problem presenting itself. He keeps telling her that he is going to build her a log cabin, where he gets this idea is never certain and Norma Jean never gives it to him. She seems only to be against the idea of the cabin but Leroy still keeps plugging his idea even after he remarks to his drug dealer that he does not think Norma Jean likes the idea. His ignorance mixed with her teenage restlessness creates a battlefield, on one side is her growing distance and rejection and on the other his blind determination to fix a relationship that broke past repair long ago. In the end Norma Jean finally moves on her intentions and Leroy is left to ponder his failings. The final moment of him on a bench still cogitating the fact that they are no longer going to work and her walking away into the mists of the battlefield leaves us with a bittersweet image of accomplishment and remorse. (581)