Infinite Jest

by David Foster Wallace

Either Joelle had some sort of problem with her thumb or she’d just got really interested in watching the thumb flex and twiddle. She was saying ‘It’s strange, not knowing it’s coming, then standing up there to speak. Folks you don’t know. Things I don’t realize I think til I say them. On the show I was used to knowing quite well what I thought before I spoke. This isn’t like that.’ She seemed to be addressing herself to the thumb. ‘I took a page from your manual and shared my complaint about the “But For the Grace of God,” and you were right, they just laughed. But I also… I hadn’t realized til I found myself telling them that I’d stopped seeing the “One Day at a Time” and “Keep It in the Day” as trite clichés. Patronizing.’ Gately noticed she still talks about Recovery-issues in a stiff proper intellectualish way she doesn’t talk about other stuff with. Her way of still keeping it all at arm’s length a little. A mental thumb to pretend to look at while she talks. It was all right; Gately’s own way of keeping it at arm’s length at the start had involved an actual arm. He pictured her laughing as he tells her that, the veil billowing mightily in and out. He smiled around the tube, which Joelle saw as encouragement. She said ‘And why Pat in counselling keeps telling me just to build a wall around each individual 24-hour period and not look over or back. And not to count days. Even when you get a chip for 14 days or 30 days, not to add them up. In counselling I’d just smile ...