Indesputable Failure

The short story, Shiloh, was intriguing to me because of the concept of marriage and failed relationships. As I read along in the story, I began to almost hope for that Shiloh would cure the marriage because it seems as though the two characters might have a deeper connection that they had forgotten. The ending of the story did not catch me by surprise, but I had hoped for the save marriage so it disheartened me.
As the story progresses, the characters become farther and farther apart from each other to the point that their relationship is destroyed. Once Leroy is finally able to be at home for his wife and to not go out onto the road on a usual basis, Norma Jean tries to get out of the house and keep their relationship distant as she is used to it being. It is as if their relationship had only held together because the two of them lived separate lives and didn’t have to deal with each other on a regular basis. In this way, both of them could be cordial and intrigued by each other because they did not know each other well enough any more to have a true relationship or to argue. As Leroy makes many attempts to get to know his wife better and to progress in their new relationship, the reader begins to feel the fruitlessness of his efforts and almost pities his position. It seems as though Norma Jean does not even want to make an effort to renew their relationship or to make it last with the ownership of the house. She does not want to make the relationship permanent because living with her husband and seeing him on a regular basis makes her realize that she has not lived life because she married so young. As the reader cannot see the thoughts of Norma Jean as we can see the thoughts of Leroy, we get a skewed idea of the patterns of the relationship. It seems as if Leroy is the caring and thoughtful one in the relationship and that he is only trying to make life better for his wife. Once Mabel convinces the couple to go to Shiloh to make their relationship better, the reader sees that there is to be a turning point in the relationship. I, however, believed this turning point would be for the better because of the scene of them both laughing at their own stupidities. From here is seems as though the couple has gotten past their dislikes of each other and are headed to make things work. But Norma Jean’s plans had never changes and the couple was doomed to fail. Norma Jean’s touchiness to the subject of her life at 18 shows that this failure was a long time coming and that, had the two not conceived a son, The relationship never would have been finalized. Because the two have nothing to keep them together, Norma Jean finally ends a relationship that was never meant to be.
This is a story of relationships and discontentedness with life in general. The couple was obviously never completely functional after the death of their son, and because of the work of Leroy. The trigger that set off the complete separation of the married coupe was that Leroy’s accident forced the two to deal with each other on a regular basis which only showed how incompatible and forced the relationship was (575).