Intersubjectivity: Episode 1

Last Saturday night, I experienced an altering event. It has changed the way I feel, think, and am. It was a moment of insight into intersubjectivity. The event itself was intersubjective in its way. Well, I will tell the story and see if I can illustrate intersubjectivity in the story. It may take a few episodes.

Saturday night, I was awakened a bit after midnight. It was a housemate of mine. We will name him Matt in this story. He knocked on the door. I groaned myself to slight levels of consciousness and called through the thick fog of sleep, “hello?” He responded, “Yeah, Chris, it's Matt.” I said confusedly, “yeah? Go ahead and open the door.” The door’s weight dragged open by the negative pull of Matt’s hand. The glare of fluorescence struck through, pushing its way past Matt’s shoulder and clamoring into the room. Matt was more gentle and stood politely at the threshold with the door half open. He may have said more in explanation since the initial insertion of his presence into my object field, but I do not recall. I was lost in the haze between sleep and waking. Soon after that indefinite haze, I heard him request my presence as a mediator (or “quasi-mediator” as he later recalled) in a dispute between himself and his girlfriend/partner/whatever. A little more awake, I asked if it could wait until the next day when I would be fully awake and not sleeping. I sympathized with the request for mediation: I think it is important and admirable to notice when outside mediation is needed to move past a rough spot in a relationship.

However, I thought it was a bit odd that he would ask me since both he and his g/p/w named Julie had taken to icing me for 3-5 months. That is: they gave me the cold shoulder, sometimes answering me as briefly as possible in conversation and other times completely ignoring me to the point of not even acknowledging I had said “hi.”

Tune in next time.