BARRY (previously mislabeled BEN)
Architect
November 11, 1956
Chicago , Illinois
First of all, how did you manage to track me down? Through your college roommate, my wife, I suppose?
I always remembered how you were 5-5 and I was 11-11. We were going to look into numerology but like every goddamn other thing, life got in the way. I'm going to bullet point this because my thoughts are racing. All I do is smoke. Only until Saturday. Oh Sophia, I am dreading every moment of every hour until next Saturday.
• I swear I was okay until around Halloween, and making notes for you: favorite books (anything written about Frank Lloyd Wright or Mies, it's likely I've read it and they're my favorites.)
• No I hate “The Fountainhead.”
• Movies: “Scarface” and “Dog Day Afternoon. Also “Making Richard”, with Al Pacino.
• For the record, Pacino is aging so gracefully and I know that the only reason my gloriously beautiful wife even married me was because we had great mind-altering sex and because I have been a double for Pacino since “Serpico”
• Did Anna even tell you I met Pacino to talk about doing double work for him as he ages?
• TRUTH! His agent called and I thought I would throw up with excitement. That's all I can think about.
• EXCEPT FOR THE FUCKING FACT THAT I'M GOING TO BE FIFTY?
• I have great regrets – not joining big firms when they asked – because they don't ask anymore
• NEVER building my Wright house and we only live here to afford the land
• I should have asked Anna to work full-time. Her part-time isn't enough but if she reads it it will be done.
• More than half of my life is over. I cannot get my mind around that. My friend Jerry says I need Buddhism. Bullshit, I need another twenty years.
• We can “come out” here. I had an affair after twenty years of marriage; Anna had three lovers after I did. She gave me an ultimatum: 3:1 ratio. For every girl I “do”, she gets three. Fair enough. The problem is that you have to know – going in – that eventually monogamy fails. She is worried she caught something from some kid she was with – she made me examine her with a flashlight while some other guy's liquids , ahem, so to speak, were still “with her:” A very very very low point.
• That was two years ago and unless she has been enjoying bending the rules
• I AM TERIFIED, BEYOND THE FLASHLIGHT INCIDENT, THAT MY WORK IS GOING TO DRY UP. The young Turks are nipping at my heels and what if I can't make any more than $46000 a year? That won't cover my mortgage and taxes. And if Anna doesn't do more than the freelance bookkeeping (she claims to be paid in cash but I find that paradoxical, because a good bookkeeper would maybe, know better, so Anna is having serial affairs or serial monogamy or something.
