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The hours are long. He works six days a week. Over the years, he has acquired a hacking cough from the sawdust and metal shavings he has swallowed. He is partially deaf from the roar of the machinery. His hands are riddled with scars. But, it is the long drive home in bumper-to-bumper traffic that he hates the most. In a few years, he will treat himself to a new truck, one with a CD player and air conditioning, and the commute will be bearable for a few more years. However, on the day of this story, he is still driving a ramshackle Nissan pickup: no air conditioning, no radio. The truck is barely functional; its frame is all but rusted away.
But, he is happy. First, it is the end of the workweek and the beginning of the winter vacation. Second, his family is together, his son and daughter home from their respective colleges. Third, he is driving home from the annual Christmas party.
Years ago, he resented having to work the day before Christmas. It was not the work he minded so much as the forced pleasantries at the annual party: the small talk, the cookies and punch, the miserly token “thanks” extended by management to the workers. However, as the mill has hired on more South American workers, the food and atmosphere at the annual party have become better. Gone is the watery punch; the workers bring in jars of horchata and heaping plates of foods my father relishes but has difficulty naming afterward. They even bring in a radio and dance on the floor of the factory. My father does not dance, but he allows himself a vicarious dancing in their presence, letting himself imagine what it is like to turn and strut among the band saws, grinders, and lathes.
He is driving home, then, feeling uncommon contentment. His worries will return in a few days: worries about whether he has wasted his life, his family’s safety, the state of the world. But, for now, he is happy. I picture it this way: him smiling, the truck’s heater ticking as it churns out hot air, a light snow blowing across the highway.
A car speeds past him on the left, threading through the thick lines of traffic. It hurtles toward the cars blocking its path in the left lane, then turns sharply into the right to avoid them, cutting off a red minivan. The van brakes to avoid the car, teeters for a second on two wheels, then tumbles, end over end, off the road and down into the ravine alongside the highway.