Post Cards from the Land of Opportunity

By Barry Fowler

 

Today I woke up with a start. I made an Irish breakfast with all the trimmings - only the sausages were andouille, no bacon, and you can forget about pudding in these parts. Beans, mushrooms, tomato, potato farls and of course, eggs. Satisfying but it takes a long time to make.

 

          I pick up the tools and load them into the boss' van. After a while my hands get cold from touching  metal on nail guns and staplers, damp cement board, pipe clamps. There is a ritualistic quality to it though and when I'm done I shake the boss' hand and say 'good luck'.

 

           Driving back to Boulder I have to concentrate hard to keep the car on the road and my hands on the wheel because a couple of weeks ago I knocked the steering out of alignment doing doughnuts in the snow outside the DMV. The front suspension is also shot and every once in a while the car veers wildly to the left and it's only a matter of time before something bad happens. There's no windscreen fluid left and when a semi passes it sprays a thick shower of dirt and slush and I can't see anything, nothing at all, and have to pull over to the shoulder, hit a bank of snow, breathe, get out of the car and wipe it down with some fresh snow and a page from the Christmas edition of Time. This happens seven, perhaps eight times. All around me snow falls silently upon ancient somber mountains, falls on the hood of the Eclipse, falls on my cheek, melts. SUVs race by, tires singing on concrete, a wail that builds, higher and higher, climaxing - to what? The road goes on and on and when I get off I feel like a professional race car driver. I'm so full of adrenalin from squinting through  tracks of grime the windscreen wipers trace across the windshield to see lane markings that when I reach dry roads I'm booking seventy, eighty maybe. I can't say because the speedometer is broken. Finally I reach a red light and let go of the wheel.

 

         It’s four o'clock by the time I get back and I hesitate before making the call. I check emails and let everyone know I won't be coming over, that I've lost the Green Card and I probably wouldn't get let back into the US if I left. There's some interesting messages from my ex-girlfriend - she wants to come over, can we be friends?  And there's a message from my wife telling me the police are looking for me. This alarms me so I’ve no choice but to make the call, let her know I'm back.

 

         The neighborhood in which my son lives is covered deep in snow and bushes are decorated with bright Christmas lights, giant oversized candy poles, holly, bunting. Each house is more brilliant than the next, everyone outdoing each other, is what it amounts to, in the competition to see who can have the most picturesque home for the holidays. Santa is in the foreground with his big head drinking a bottle of Coca-Cola.  It's the onset of Christmas that affects me more than the actual Christmas itself, the knowledge that I will be spending Christmas without family rather than the actual experience, by which time I'm immune.

 

         I still call her my wife. We're not divorced yet. She answers the door in a very fine black and white floral pattern dress from Anthropologie, and it's low cut enough to reveal breasts that I have to look at but can't for too long because for one, it arouses me and two, more importantly, it enrages me, not just because I want to ravage them and can't but mainly because they cost nine grand and this girl, woman, mother of my child,  can't afford to pay her next rent check and will probably be filing for bankruptcy in January. I can see the surgeon got rid of the stretch marks somehow and the skin is smoothed over but they don't look that big. What a waste. If I had nine grand...I'd probably spend it on booze and big tits too, I suppose. An SUV so big that if it were in Ireland it would easily take up both sides of the road thunders by and Becky(my wife) sticks her head out, as if expecting someone.  Maybe she's already putting them to use. She invites me in, she has to do so twice because I'm shocked the first time and can't believe it.

 

         I see my son and he stops, recognizes me as though I'm someone he barely knew from a long time ago and I realize I've lost something, the feelings I have for my son don't seem to come to the fore right now. He seems different even though it's only been a week. He continues on  what he was doing when I arrived, which is chasing a laser light across the floor with some other kid. Jack, Stacy's kid, holds the laser, looks exceedingly bored as usual and I go into the kitchen to say hi to Stacy and to Rachelle, who I haven't seen in years. They seem distant, it's only the barest veneer of cordiality that I am given and I introduce myself to another woman who has short hair, hippie clothes and gives me the look as though I were the devil. I recognize furniture, books and a painting of mine on the wall. These items, familiar from a time when we lived together are now placed in surroundings completely alien to me, in an arrangement and manner that I had absolutely nothing to do with. I remember the day I created the painting: I am sitting in the studio, the sunlight pouring through the skylight onto the canvas, bouncing off the white walls. It's hot outside but cool in the studio. I use just three colors : Grey, white and blue. Grey sky, blue sea, white boat. I can hear the ocean crashing against the hull of the yacht and it just powers through the waves, slicing them open like a shark. The work flows out of me, I am completely absorbed. The outside world exists beyond and what that means is that I have a girlfriend to come home to. End.

 

         Becky is hovering around me for some unknown reason and I notice she carries herself differently, almost like a peacock. I'm aware that her mother is lurking somewhere and I don't want to face that.

'I feel...uncomfortable here...' I say.

'Yes, you should probably go. It's better for us.'

I don't know what to say and I wander into a room to find my son. He's playing chasing or some sort of funny kids' game and I walk over to him, tickle him, attempt to recreate something. He sighs and puts his head softly on the couch cushion. I stop a moment and look at him. Then he gets up and runs after the other little kid who is hiding behind the Christmas tree in the corner. I think of the condo where I live, the grey north-facing sitting room and stark white walls of the bedroom, cluttered with the crib and my bed.

'Listen, I don't think I'll take him today. I mean, he's having such a good time here. I don't want to take him from that. What do you think?'

'I don't know. He's your son. You haven't seen him in a week.'

'What do you think... is best for him?'

She sighs. 'I think he should stay here. He’s having a lot of fun. But hey, you're not working Wednesday are you?'

'Nope.'

'Why don't you pick him up early Wednesday morning. I'll have him ready bright and early for you.'

'Ok.'

 

         On a different day I might be glad that I didn't have to look after Sam because it would give me more time to do...what?  Walking back to the car I'm feeling hollow, at a loss with what to do with myself. So I head downtown to do some shopping. It is Christmas Eve, after all.

 

          I discover a new vintage clothing store on Pearl. Stephen's brother Henry just deposited a nice lump sum for a Christmas present so I'm feeling rather flush with the cash and there's so many items I like in the store that I work myself into some kind of Beverly Hills-wife frenzy. By the time I'm all done I've bought myself two flannel shirts, a red  Fila sweater and a Police t-shirt from 1982. I flirt with a very attractive cashier, who asks me why I came here after I tell her I'm Irish. I answer with the line about the couple from Boulder whom I met on their honeymoon in Malaysia, which although true, isn't the truth, really. Twenty year olds don't typically like to date guys with kids, is what I've found.

 

         I get myself a haircut in Zing and there's some incredible pieces of art that I meditate on while the hairdresser massages my scalp. There's one I like in particular, a print of the Mona Lisa with magenta lipstick smeared across her lips. I look at the title: 'Mardi Gras redbreast Mona Lisa.' The hairdresser informs me that it is a genuine Andy Warhol print and that it is for sale and that he isn't sure of the price but he could ask the owner if I liked. It's beyond my means of course, although I can't help thinking about how my bedroom would look with matching kitsch bedclothes and a jade plant entwined around a brass pipe sculpture, complete with shutoff valve, also in the salon, also for sale. A cute young impressionable girl one night would come home and my bedroom would be pimped out to the hilt. The urge to blow all the Christmas money on extra-terrestrial garbage is very strong but passes.

 

         A James Dean haircut, a red Ferrari racing jacket and a pair of Diesel jeans later, I'm feeling very attractive and finish up the day with pressies for my family - a Pink Panther DVD box set for my mother, a picture book on Boulder for father and a Thomas Bangalter CD for my brother. I won't post them today, it could be February by the time they get there for all I care. It's meaningless, really.

 

         I get home and there's a postcard from my father. The picture on the postcard is something I've seen many times before when I worked in the National Gallery as a security attendant: The Liffey Swim by Jack Butler Yeats. It is a particularly thought provoking image, as the quays haven't changed much since old Yeats painted them. I know the exact spot at which the onlookers peer over the low granite walls to cheer on the swimmers. I passed it every day on my way into college from the island penthouse in Chapelizod, cheered not swimmers but rowers in the College boat race. I had a girl on the Ladies' boat, a busty blonde Norwegian named Katinka who looked better than Victoria Silvstedt. The postcard reads:

 

          'Barry -

         Hope this gets to you in time for Christmas.

          I know it’s been very tough this year, but each year gives you a harsh lesson in life that you can use to your benefit later on.

         I think it is a pity that we don't communicate more, but I was glad to hear that you rang a few days ago.

         Don't forget, if it's too tough do not hesitate to jump on a plane, swallow your pride and come home to chill out for a while. Still, if you want to stay, it's your choice, keep yourself proactive for something in the art world - why don't you contact the guys that gave        you first place in that competition? If you got a job on the East Coast, you could still see Sam.

          Buck up, smile, laugh and I hope 2008 is a better year.

         All the best,

          Mick.

 

When my dad was young, younger even than I am now, he emigrated to become a professional middle-distance runner. He wanted to go to Australia and train with Hale Bopp or someone in Australia but he ended up in a boarding house in London with a bunch of misfits. After a few years he came home with his tail between his legs, I suppose. I don't know because I never talked to him about it.

 

Earlier this week I got a phone call from my friend Stephen in Ireland. I told him I wouldn't be coming over to Spain as planned. He said I was the most mentally strong person he knew and I felt very good about that. He recommended that I watch a certain film, Ingmar Bergman's Summer with Monica. So I rented it but after half an hour had to turn it off. Although the compositions and the lighting made for some of the most sumptuous images I'd ever seen on film, I felt like someone had knifed me in the stomach. So much European old-world sentimental nostalgia could not be funny anymore. It was too close to home.

 

In Ireland they say I'm tough - that's the word they use to describe me. If I go back, then I will have repeated the failure of my father, I will have become him. But maybe if he was in my situation, he would think the same way, if his father had done what he had done. He didn't have a kid then. Eitherway, this realization doesn't change much.

 

         There's still a few hours in the day left to kill and watching internet porn I find myself more drawn towards women with obviously fake boobs than usual. The walls of my bedroom are stark white alleviated only by pencil markings where Sam has scribbled on the wall. Why haven't I decorated it, painted it green and gold even, made it homelier? I could paint a picture or something but I don't. And lying in bed awake I start to make a list of what I would like for Christmas:

1)The D&G jacket that Jess Franco wore on the cover of Vogue Hommes International.

2) A new girlfriend.

3) To be with the family on Christmas Day, just for Christmas Day. It would give me another two years.

 

Suddenly I realize why I woke up so early this morning. It's Christmas - pressies. And all that.

         

 

 

Author’s Bio: The Story Postacards from the land of Opportunity is autobiographical in nature. Irish writer Barry Fowler first travelled to Boulder, Colorado in 2001 to visit friends he had met backpacking in Malaysia. Some sort of spiritual connection with the place occurred, and the following years saw many return visits to the sun-drenched Rocky Mountains. Whilst on one of these trips he met his future wife, Rebecca Robinson, who became pregnant. Barry returned home to Ireland to complete his degree in Media Arts at Dublin's Institute of Technology, and upon graduating there, made the decision to emigrate so as to live with his son, Sam Fowler. He married Rebecca in 2006; however the relationship was troublesome and short-lived, and the pair divorced a year later.

As an immigrant waiting on a Green Card, Barry Fowler was forced to accept many kinds of difficult construction and labor jobs as the only viable means of providing for his son, including working in a landfill and shoveling snow among other occupations. Despite having received an excellent education and speaking many foreign languages, most jobs were not open to him as he did not have a work permit.

When the Green Card did at last arrive not much much changed at first, and Barry still worked in construction to support himself. He set up a Film Production company with a fellow filmmaker which ultimately failed. In 2008 Barry decided to take a volunteer position at Boulder Municipal Channel 8 and he was soon offered an internship there. He began writing scripts for one of the television shows, 'What's Happening Boulder.' This move to Channel 8 proved decisive as within months he managed by way of a friend to land a job interview in a marketing firm . He now works at Greenhouse Partners of Boulder as a full time copywriter.

Barry has written articles for Denver's 303 magazine, and his short stories and films have received numerous awards both nationally and internationally, among them, the story James and the Valium winning the Oxygen Student Media Award,(Ireland) and the film 'The Importance of Being Dead' winning Best Student Film at Plymouth International Film Festival.