Cold River Stare

He missed them already. His mom, dad and sister. In downtown Omaha he sat in his work van staring at the cold Missouri River. The large parking lot gave refuge to just Ron today. The lot was usually more busy in the summer time for people wanting to take the walking bridge into Council Bluffs but in the winter it was no more than a spot for people like Ron to stop and eat their lunch. Ron was a bit chubby, clean shaven wearing a golf shirt and khaki's with so much in ground dirt in them that no detergent could get them back to their former glory again.

For the work he did, he wasn't allowed to wear jeans because customers might get upset a his appearance of looking too free or being too comfortable...at least from the mindset of the company he worked for. He fixed outdoor movie kiosks for a living. They paid him just enough but never a penny more. They were content watching him work sixteen hour days driving all over Nebraska and they were also content with only giving him four days off a month. They put him on call after regular shifts and by the time he got home to see his family every night, they were already in bed. He had a one year old daughter he rarely saw because he was always out working.

Ron chewed his bologna and cheese sandwich staring at the barren trees on the Iowa side of the river. The grey clouds blanketed the sky. Still, for a brief moment Ron thought it was pretty to look at so he took out his phone, opened his social media page and took a photo of the river with a comment on the photo that said, "what a B-E-A-Utiful day!!" As soon has he took the photo, his appreciation of it had passed and he went back to chewing his soggy sandwich. He was far away from the people he loved back in South Carolina.

A year and a half before there had been a build up of fights and disagreements. A buildup of hurtful things said to him by both his parents and his wife towards each other. Ron was caught in the middle often trying and failing to keep both parties happy. His parents didn't like Ada but they had made an effort to try to be good to her so they could spend more time with their grand daughter. Ron still remembered the final visit he and Ada had to his parents house the day before they left to move to Nebraska. Both of his parents had dressed in black because of the immense sadness at no longer being able to be near their only grand child. They knew that Ada pulled the strings in the marriage and that Ron was just doing what was best to keep his own family together. What Ada didn't know after the move was that Ron ground his teeth in anger at the smallest little things every day and he cried in his van alone at least twice a day. Ron knew he was just as guilty as Ada for the move away from his family. Ada had desperately wanted to get away from them and once they got to Nebraska, her attitude didn't change nor was she grateful for her husband ruining his relationship with his own family to be "as far away from family as possible". In reality they weren't far away from family. They were now closer to hers.

A tear dropped down Rons face as he remembered this time. This was only his first cry of the day. The lump in his throat made it hard for him to swallow the pudding he had moved onto in his lunch. He didn't have the guts to do the thing he wanted to do which was go home, pack a bag and drive back to South Carolina. He would have gladly left all of the things he owned behind but then he thought often about his own Dad who never knew his father and thought twice on it. There was the other option for which there was no coming back. Staring at the river, Ron thought briefly about going up to the walking bridge and then jumping into the cold river. He wasn't going to do it of course. Ron had been too afraid to stand up to his wife when he met her, when he married her, when he had a child with her and when he moved away from his family. It was then that Ron started hitting himself on the side of his head as he thought, "You still have family. You know. The ones you're supposed to provide for? Snap out of it!! You made your bed". Often when Ron cried he only gave himself a few minutes and then he would do what he was doing now. Self slaps to the side of his head seemed to pull him back together. "Men don't do this. We don't cry. We don't hurt. We push on and we deal with things." Ron thought as he heard his dads voice in his head.

Ron realized his van was idling too long. He had to run it to keep warm but of course, his company had put a device on board that monitored how long he sat, how long he idled, how fast he went, how slow he went and anything else they told him they were tracking. He turned it off, pulled the keys from the ignition and threw on his jacket. It was then that he thought of the day he was hired. Back when he was paid less but could pass off the work when he couldn't fix something minor. In Columbia, he was excited just to get a job that paid more than what he was earning at the tire shop he worked at. He'd gone back to school and gotten certifications that would get him into the IT world and back then, he was too naive to understand that the work they gave him didn't live up to his capabilities. Career wise, the move to Omaha allowed him to fulfill his potential of being able to fix the robotics in these movie machines effectively and it paid a little more money. The day he was hired he'd gone in for his interview and his boss hired him right there on the spot. Ron had aced every training the company sent him to Georgia for. Later when he got to Omaha, he tested one of the highest scores in the company on his electromechanical aptitude test. When he started his job in Columbia, he liked it for about a week before he started dealing with folks above his bosses head. More tech movement meant more money for them and the same money for him.

Now, sitting in his van, Ron wasn't crying anymore. He was grinding his teeth in anger. Even two years on, in a different state, he hated who he worked for. This was how Ron spent his lunches most days. Crying and then getting angry. Sitting in different spots to eat lunch or screaming in anger as he got new work order notifications from both his phone and his smartphone while then feeling the need to move his van because he felt like someone was giving him a stare that said, "If you don't move that creepy van I'll call the police."

Just over a decade later, after Ron was back in Columbia having lost his Dad while he was away, gotten divorced and was now dating someone who truly loved him and having a job where he didn't have to drive a van anymore, Ron, with a little salt and pepper on his beard stared out at the Atlantic Ocean. A large vast body of water that had no trees on the other side. No walking bridge. No clouds in the sky. No cold winter. Ron thought for just a moment about that van and that cold river. "I wish I had a time machine so I could at least go back and tell him that everything would be okay." Ron took a deep breath as he stood on the beach and smiled with gratefulness in his heart. A tear ran down his face. A happy one.