Life in the Air Ocean by Syvlia Foley
"Life in the Air Ocean" by Sylvia Foley explores the emotional landscape of a new mother named Iris, who is grappling with feelings of isolation and a longing for freedom. Set against the backdrop of her home, where she often finds herself on the roof sipping wine and watching over her newborn daughter, Ruth, Iris reflects on her life choices and the mundane realities surrounding her. Her husband, Daniel, a refrigeration engineer with military experience, dreams of relocating to Colombia, but Iris feels increasingly trapped in her current existence.
The narrative delves into Iris's psychological turmoil, symbolized by her preoccupation with birds representing flight and freedom, contrasted with the gray meat she packs in the baby carriage, which serves as a metaphor for her own sense of despair. Following an impulsive leap from the roof that results in a broken arm, Iris's journey continues as she confronts feelings of aimlessness. A visit to the local library leads her to a moment of recklessness, where she discards books into nearby tar pits, symbolizing her struggles and the weight of her unfulfilled aspirations.
Overall, the story captures the complexities of motherhood and the search for identity, revealing the internal conflict of a woman caught between nurturing responsibilities and her desire for personal liberation.
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Life in the Air Ocean by Syvlia Foley
First published: 1999
Type of plot: Psychological
Time of work: 1955
Locale: Carville, Tennessee
Principal Characters:
Iris Mowry , a twenty-eight-year-old woman who has recently given birth to a daughterDaniel Mowry , her husband, a refrigeration engineer who plans to move with his family to South AmericaRuth , their daughter
The Story
Iris Mowry spends her days sitting on the edge of the roof of her home drinking wine and keeping an eye on her newborn daughter, Ruth, in a carriage below. Her husband, Daniel, a refrigeration engineer, was once in the military and stationed at the nearby missile base. Now, he occupies himself with building the cellar in their home in his free time and with thoughts of moving to Colombia, where his expertise in refrigeration would be well received. Meanwhile, Iris drifts in an emotional and spiritual limbo, preoccupied with the birds that represent to her flight and freedom and with the meat that she has purchased at the local supermarket and packed into the baby's carriage. When she presses the meat with her finger, it turns gray. The image stays with her all day as she sits on the roof drinking wine. It returns to her thoughts along with strains of Mexican music and thoughts of going to Colombia. When Daniel comes home from work, she realizes that he now has gray teeth and is gray on the inside, like the meat. He tries coaxing her from the rooftop, but she leaps onto the lawn below, breaking her arm.
Relaxing beside the pool at a neighbor's home a few days later, her arm now in a cast, Iris continues to be preoccupied with thoughts of helplessness, aimlessness, and failure. She leaves her baby with her neighbor and goes to return some overdue books to the library. Finding herself beside the tar pits that lie at the edge of her neighborhood, she is overcome with dark thoughts; bubbles rising to the surface remind her of little mouths trying to suck in air. On an impulse, she throws the library books into the tar pits, one of them the volume of the Book of Knowledge that contains an entry on Colombia. As she peers into the black tar pit, she seems to see the medical team that aided her when she leaped from the roof, only now it is rushing past her to another emergency.