Many More Miles To Go

Today, it’s been one year on the road. One year ago, as I sat in the company orientation class in Green, Ohio, I was revved up and ready to get my new profession started. The economy had beaten me up pretty good and by October of 2008, I knew I had to give up nearly ten years in sales. It was over for me. At that point, I determined it wasn’t a good idea to be selling people homes and autos, so I decided another re-invention of myself was in order. Over the road trucking appealed to me and the notion of seeing the country with no one looking over my shoulder seemed like the right way to go. I’ve never had a traditional job, working traditional hours so this type of way to make a living appeared to be in my comfort zone. In December, I enrolled in a truck driving school for a January start. Lora, my career counselor said everything was going to be just fine and soon I would have a new career. I believed her and immediately felt like I made the right decision.


January came quickly and it was a relief to see a lot of guys in the class that were my age and that the instructors weren’t the Gestapo I thought they’d be. The whole staff was a group of seasoned professionals and had some good stories to tell. After a week of classroom study taught by William, I passed the permit test with flying colors and then it was time to get in the truck and drive. My road instructor, Jim was firm and helpful. At one point, I was having trouble with a maneuver when he came up to the window of the eighteen wheeler and pointedly asked “do you go to church?” I perplexedly replied that indeed I did at which point he rolled his sleeve up and revealed a tattoo of Jesus on his forearm. He then continued “you have to have faith that if you set this maneuver up correctly, this truck and trailer will go exactly where it’s supposed to go.” Now do it! With Jim’s instruction, I went on to pass my over the road driving exam with confidence and receive the coveted “Class A Commercial Driver’s License.”

The year since has blazed by and now, I’ve travelled over a hundred thousand miles. I'll never forget my first dispatch. After making a "clean break" from the auto business, they send me to Detroit to deliver..what else...auto parts! Another example of how ironic my life is at times. As the earth rotated quickly, I’ve covered a lot of ground. Criss-crossing the country has become a dance routine on a different scale. Moving from one side of the stage to the other like a Bugs Bunny vaudevillian, I race from coast to coast and border to border. The mission has usually been a cannon ball run around obstacles and events that prevent a straight line. Some things that have occurred on the road are just as I imagined they would be. Other things are a little different and even yet some things are far from what I expected before I began life as an Over The Road Long Haul Trucker. I thought I’d have more time to see old friends and sightsee, but not so with some of these dispatches and travel times. For the most part, the truck stops and shower facilities are better kept than I imagined and sleeping in a truck is not as foreboding as one might think. It’s more like a camping experience, except the campgrounds are truck stops with hundreds of trucks sitting in snap line rows with the sound of their diesel engines droning on incessantly. I found that foraging for food can be a fun experience in new places.

Expediting has turned out to be a form of this business that has a strange appeal to me. It’s like having to urgently go to bathroom, but you don’t know where it is. You just know you have to get there, quickly. The time sensitive nature and destination of the freight I carry have turned this type of trucking into a “pants on fire” adventure at times. It’s also kind of like the hot air ballooning I did extensively in the 80’s with my old friend Jim Mount and his “Looking Up” balloon. You go up, but you really never know where you’re going to land. Somebody once asked “can’t you steer those things?” The answer is no, it all depends upon where the air currents take you. You control when you take off and what your altitude will be, but the rest is up to God. Landing is the real challenge in hot air ballooning as is slotting in freight on time in expediting. Fire the burner to go up and pull on the rope to let hot air out of the balloon to come down. That’s all the real control you have in the sport. In my job, as in ballooning, I have to know just when to fire the burner and when to yank on the rope. Part of that expertise in this kind of work is to know when to take the opportunity and go and when to decline it. Sometimes you have only precious moments of time to decide. Being decisive is a requisite in this job. I have to process in short order the question of “will this run take me to a good freight hub or will I be potentially stranded out in left field and have to travel long distances with no freight?” I take all of this into consideration while calculating fuel costs and profit. Like a poker game, I’m drawing and tossing out cards all day. As Kenny Rogers sang in “The Gambler”, you got to know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em. Know when to walk away and when to run! By run, I mean that I avoid places like Long Island, New York at any cost. It’s a hard place to drive when you consider the traffic, the way people drive and how much it costs to get there when the tolls suck money out of your pocket like an Electrolux. Plus, there are no truck stops on the Island. I’ll go to New York City because I know I can get to the relative safety of New Jersey fairly quickly, but getting out of Long Island is a tall order.

When I speak with freight agents, it’s usually a compact negotiation that takes place quickly, because the freight has to be somewhere soon. In addition, sometimes I’m competing for the same freight with other nearby drivers from my company to make it even more challenging. From another perspective, it’s like a huge board game that’s fun to play!

After years in sales and negotiation, this type of work suits me perfectly. When I contemplated trucking, I never once thought I’d be using skill sets from my previous career. Life is funny to me like that sometimes. You’re being guided and prepared without ever knowing it. It confirms my faith.

A lot of Long Haul jobs in trucking companies have dedicated routes and drivers know what to expect on a regular basis. With my company, I do get to run some dedicated routes from one shipper in particular, but the destinations vary. When I pull up to the warehouse, I know the drill for this company. It’s nice to have at least one place I can go to and not have to think too much. Typically though, when I accept a freight opportunity, it’s a sprint to complete paperwork and a mad dash to locate a shipper and a consignee (the one who receives the delivery) in a location I’ve never been to. It's kind of like another version of “Where’s Waldo?” Sometimes, too, it’s similar to an Easter egg hunt where they hide the eggs real good.

Strangely, the country is getting smaller to me. What I once perceived as an arduous journey across the nation is now just another task on another day. I drive 400 miles for breakfast. Eleven hours behind the wheel isn’t the intimidating thought it once was. It’s all a state of mind. The truck I drive doesn’t feel as big as it once did. This can be a real trap, and I always adhere to the teachings I learned in school regarding safety procedures. Yes, you can get too comfortable with these trucks! A mechanical pre-trip inspection is a must and I walk around the Fat Cat to make sure lights are working and I beat on the tires with a rubber mallet to make sure they are inflated properly. I look for leaking fluids and to see that nothing is askew. I have learned to operate ratchet load securing straps (these things can give you fits!) and work the temperamental landing gear that props up my cargo hold from the rear. Mine has a manual crank that operates with finesse at times. Who says a trucker doesn’t get aerobic exercise? I use heavy metal load securing bars to insure that freight doesn’t shift or move. This is especially important when I haul hazardous materials like flammable liquids or sensitive items like a jet engine.

Prior to a run, I avoid sugar and concentrate on protein before I depart to regulate my system before a long run. I prefer un-sweetened ice tea to drink. It’s good to make sure things that I will want will be close at hand, like additional water and snacks. I insure that my satellite radio remote is close by and my cell phone has a good charge with the head set within reach.

Trip planning is an important part of my routine. I have a GPS unit, but I don’t follow it like some drivers do. A GPS unit will lead you right off the edge of a cliff, if you allow it. You have to physically look at a map and plot out a route on a motor carrier’s atlas. A GPS unit is a computer and it will send you on remote two lane roads through a series of small towns with lights and 35 mile per hour speed limits to save you a half mile on the trip. Trucks can’t go on every road a car can travel. You have to be constantly aware of your surroundings by watching further up ahead than a car for low bridges, power lines and tricky road configurations. This is especially true in cities where sometimes roads are narrow and intersections are tight. One time, I had to do at pick up in Central Falls, Rhode Island where the loading dock was in a garage right at the edge of a narrow road, on a busy afternoon rush hour. It was necessary to stop traffic by sticking the rear end of my truck right into traffic to get to it. Once inside, I learned that my cargo would be thousands of pounds of delicate glass tubing to be transported over rough New England roads. Double whammy! I hate transporting glass, even more than the skull and crossbones stuff.

One thing I have noticed is that we are increasingly becoming a national chain nation. There are Wal-Mart’s everywhere. The grocery stores are more regional because of the way fresh food is distributed, but the big chains dominate. There are surprisingly few towns in America where you can find local drug and department stores. Craving a McDonald’s Big Mac? You will never have to go very far ANYWHERE in the country for two all beef patties on a sesame seed bun with special sauce. It will just cost a ton of money in places like Connecticut. Take an exit off just about any interstate and chances are you will see something familiar. I look for local legends and anything that is unfamiliar. That’s how Route 66 used to be they tell me.

Having been to most states, I now open the state by state section of USA Today and the whole page looks local to me. I hear national news on TV and most times when they talk about a town somewhere where news is taking place, I either have been there or know where it is. America has become one big local community to me. The one thing that is different and interesting to me is the regional dialects of language. Mid Atlantic people tend to leave off consonants on the ends of words. In Brooklyn, New York, they add “R’s” and say “terlit” instead of toilet. New Englanders add a dimension of nasal acoustics to speech. Just put a clothes pin on your nose and talk, you’ll fit right in. Southerners have different tones of accents, but for the most part they just open their mouths and the words fall out. To think that all Southerners speak slowly is a myth. Try to keep up with a native Atlantan. True Cajuns from Louisiana and Mississippi have a certain aristocratic sound. I can pick out a Texas southern easily. Appalachia is a whole different world. You might need an interpreter there. Words and gestures are baffling at times. I knew old timer from Big Stone Gap, Virginia and “yes” was “yay-ya” and the bathroom was “the howsa.” Upstate New York, Ohio and Michigan are somewhat alike and unique sounding. I would say their accent is probably the hardest to imitate. Nearby Indiana doesn’t have and accent. That’s what the so-called language experts say. I tend to agree. They have a straight ahead Midwestern tone. The rest of the Midwest varies slightly. Now, if we’re talking about Wisconsin, Minnesota and the Dakotas, you really need to see the movie “Fargo” to get a true upper Midwest accent. They kind of over play the dialect it to create somewhat of a comical touch in the movie. A good portion of Florida and Urban California sounds like New York City and New Jersey. It’s got to be the huge transplant influence. I haven’t been to Alaska, but Sarah Palin has made me aware that there is an accent there. I like the fact that Hawaii economizes words. I understand “Aloha” means hello and goodbye. The accent is on the ring of flowers. In reality, you can drive three thousand miles and understand what everybody is saying, for the most part. Even if we can’t hear one another, there are some great hand signals. In Los Angeles, Chicago and New York In traffic, I’ve seen people waving with one or no fingers! Such a friendly places.

The physical beauty of America is outstanding. There is something worth seeing in every state I’ve been to. A month ago I had the good fortune of driving on one of the most scenic routes I’ve ever been to. Route 285 which runs down though the center of Colorado is breathtaking. At the same time, the elevation at 9,000 feet will make you short of breath. It’s literally breathtaking. The road winds and dips and at times is just like a roller coaster. When I was there, the snow covered mountains were truly dramatic. Campsites and interesting little towns popped up all along the way. I yearned to be travelling in a motor home instead of the Fat Cat. I’ve enjoyed the Sierras, Cascades and the California ranges out west as well. The east offers some great trips though the Catskills, Adirondack, Appalachian, Blue Ridge, White, Green and Ozark mountains too. There is no shortage of mountain scenery in the United States.

Mighty rivers traverse our land on a grand scale. The Mississippi is a sight to behold and I’ve crossed it in several regions of the country. The Columbia which separates Washington and Oregon is awesome to view. The Rio Grande in Texas makes a long border between us and Mexico. The Ohio probably has more quaint towns and impressive all American cities on its banks than any other. Located right on the Ohio, Cincinnati is a picturesque and well rounded metropolis as viewed on a hill from the Kentucky side with plenty of riverside attractions. Pittsburgh, where the Monongahela and the Allegheny form the Ohio, has transformed from a dirty old steel town to a land of high tech and a cleaner environment. The St. John’s River that runs through the middle of Jacksonville, Florida, is the only river in North America that flows from south to north. Add the Delaware, The St. Charles, The Hudson and The Tennessee and you know that we are a nation of great rivers.

As for coastline, we’ve got plenty of that too. The problem is though, there aren’t a whole lot of truck routes that hug the coastline. I’ve been on a few good ones like the Pacific Coast Highway and AIA in Florida, just not in the truck. Many of us yearn to be on the coast to feel the sand, the sea and the air. There’s just something very therapeutic about the beach. It soothes the soul and fills the senses with serenity.

When I think of over- all friendliness, there are lots of places in all regions of the country where the people are amiable and smile a lot. California is a pretty happy place for the most part. They don’t seem concerned that the next big earthquake, forest fire or mudslide could be moments away. My favorite Mad comic, Alfred E. Newman must have been from here. His motto is “What, Me Worry?” The south is a generally hospitable place, but Mississippi and Louisiana seem to stand out to me in addition to my home state of Georgia. Kentucky and Tennessee are also good for hospitality. I like Texas for over all niceness and New Mexico gets my vote as well. Colorado and Utah folks will make you feel comfortable and right at home. Pennsylvania is a tale of two cities where Pittsburgh gets the advantage over Philadelphia. Florida is problematic with lots of crabby old New Yorkers and Boston can go either way depending on if you’re a Sox fan. Generally, we’re a good nation willing to help each out with a kind word or a good deed.

The weather in the past year has had its challenges. I’ve driven in 12 sizeable snow storms and seen some frigid temperatures along the way. Ironically, the coldest I’ve been was in my home state of Georgia last February when the mercury hit 10 degrees with no power because the truck wouldn’t start. Michigan came in second with a brisk wind off Lake Michigan at St. Joseph in November. I didn’t feel the cold as much out west in the Rockies in Places like Salt Lake City and Idaho because of the elevation and dry air. I have definitely been hot in a few places. Laredo, Texas comes to mind first where it hit 107 when I was there. I could have popped out of my truck like bread out of a toaster. Phoenix was 97 at ten in the morning when I was there. Yuma, Arizona was the all time hottest when I felt 119. The only other time I feel that kind of heat is when I check my cornbread in the oven. I have to remind myself to drink extra water and wear a cowboy hat in the sun. I’ll stick a fan in my face and idle the engine for air conditioning as much as I can. As for good weather, California is a good place to be, when it’s not raining buckets. I’m very fond of the south in spring. The far north becomes comfortable in summer. As far as driving, fog is my least favorite. I hit a lot of it on several trips, at night, in Indiana. Snow doesn’t bother me as long as the road departments clear it off good and I don’t have to “chain up” the tires. Rain just makes the truck dirty when all that road grime splashes up on her and can be wicked in cities regarding the way people drive.

In all, I like this type of work, but I’m not sure how long I can be out on the road. It can be a real grind when you’re away from home for long periods of time. But, for now, I’m taking it days at a time, not wanting to get too far ahead of myself or too far behind. I have a few ideas of what I want to do next, but I haven’t fully thought them through. So, for now, I’ll continue this gypsy way of life. Here today, gone tomorrow and somewhere else the next day. As we speak, I’m working up my Top 10 favorite lists. The lists will be of favorite small towns, favorite cities, favorite road songs, favorite food stops and favorite truck stops to mention a few.

To me America is a great place. I’m not done seeing it all. Figuratively speaking, I want to meet all the Americans and see the places that the locals love to be. There are many more miles to go, many more places to see and many more stories to write.