A lifeline that (so far) falls symmetrically between the 20 and 21st century was perfect placement for me to have existed if you think about it.
As a Gen Xer??? I've had the distinct pleasure of being raised under the influence of cherry scented pencil lead, scratch-and-sniff stickers and secondhand cigarette smoke.
Like everyone else from my vintage I grew up behind a veil woven of Saturday morning cartoons and proper pop rock music; I've seen the rise of video games and the fall of Corporal punishment.
As vastly different as the horse drawn, gun slinging 1890s were from the 1920s? I recognize that we're even more removed now from when I was a kid.
By the time GPS really takes off and revolutionizes the navigation game??? THIS dude's already had the opportunity to earn HIS million mile merit badge and the ability to hang his keys up feeling accomplished.
Yes; (much like Marco Polo before me) I too can claim a helm that's done its swiveling and cranks in a time when man was still at the mercy of sextant COMPASSES and PAPER.
Rolodex was once a piece of industry leading technology.
Our maps were wire bound - or at least the GOOD ones.
Now - I've always dealt with some form of GPS; don't get me wrong? During my hour, however ... The difference is those bad boys worked in reverse.
They were known as “tattle boxes”.
We had units that told 'the powers that be' where WE were and how fast we were going; if they offered turn by turn directions – I certainly (agonizingly) missed that feature.
Directions were usually handled by dispatch.
And by that I mean... In a land before cellphones - one would commonly find themselves hovered around a stranger's telephone booth desperately trying to translate between all this land's different language dialects and annunciations; pen and wire bound paper tablet in hand.
Oh! And, somewhere down the line??? If “Thomas Guide” doesn't make HIS appearance (yet ANOTHER book – because remember how paper once ruled the world); then it wasn't an authentic 20th century experience.
I guess the same technology worked for the first moon landing, but the road was quite a bit different back then – even if it still sorta looks the same.
It was because of this world's handy little handicap and my poor sense of direction I'm sure I don't have to tell you who got lost somewhere on the atlas pretty much every single day.
I bet you if you were to tally the entire duration I was completely confused throughout my tenure? There would at least be a solid month of me straight scratching the back of my head and cussing like a sailor.
Well? It was the SAME year I left Job Corps, but toward the end. 1998???
Werner Enterprises had to be coaxed into gambling on me.
My next alma mater, Western Pacific Truck School - back when they were in Lakewood?!! Yeah; they called in a special favor.
At 21, I was the youngest in my graduating class and thus a much higher insurance risk than these other perspective drivers.
Plus with an immature employment history working against me?? Opportunities just weren't presenting themselves. Bally's (Western Pacific Truck School's parent company) wasn't about to get their tuition payment unless someone got me the placement I was promised.
All I can tell you is that my initial Werner trainer TONY??? Tony was a piece of SHIT.
Terminated after I turned him in for … stealing from me.
He even had the nerve to drag his kids into it?
That's the REALLY simple version of this story??? But, THAT'S pretty much all it boils down to.
Living through an experience like that tends to be all encompassing when you're essentially living in a vehicle? I much prefer chlorophyll green over desert BEIGE as this was my first experience with southern California.
The only thing HE was good at teaching is that humanity can suck sometimes, Victorville, California makes me thirsty and isn't a place I wanna come to know more than I already have - and most importantly... The sonofabitch taught me how to get away with hauling unauthorized passengers.
His wife illegally lived with us the WHOLE time and rode through damn near every state with us.
I don't remember getting along with my last trainer either... I can't place his name, but (of course) I'd remember the complaint he lodged against me.
The teacher I do remember (fondly) was the fella I had right there in the middle.
His CB handle was 'Wizard'.
He looked like Merlin if you took his robe and dressed him like Quentin Tarantino dressed Jules and Vincent at the end of Pulp Fiction.
Picture a pink neck canvas behind white cotton. Picture an emaciated Santa in a T shirt that screams someone's on vacation. Then give that man fetish for shower tickets.
My 22nd birthday found us heading west bound on I-80 and in the boring part of Nevada?
I'm the one driving when I hear the sleeper berth curtain's Velcro seal tear open. Wizard plants one right on my passenger's side cheek (completely platonically; beg your pardon) and then buys me a pancake breakfast at that one Mill City T A truck stop that's in the middle of nowhere.
Because he was so crazy, we got along just fine.
He's the type you have to wear earplugs bunking next to on the count of his night terrors.
Also - because of the early start I got into the industry??? I was able to turn around and teach other guys how to keep all eighteen wheels on the pavement for themselves and introduce them to the trucker lifestyle at something like age 23 or 24.
This introduces friends of mine like Russell Crumpton - who ... side note??? Happens to speak with a very pronounced Cockney accent.
When you're around him twenty-four/seven??? You tend to grow immune; it's like you don't hear it anymore, but words like “bloody” or better “bloo'y” and “mate” suddenly pop up in your vernacular even though it sounds funny spoken in your louder heavy set basic American Caucasian male with that Midwestern timber “Don't-cha-know!”
Not too many people (I'm guessing) can say they've lived in what amounts to a SHOE BOX with an ol' timey pirate.
Well... I can't either, but with Russell I can say I've come damn close.
“Ahhh the time we went from Bragg to Torrance, California to Groveport, Ohio in three days!” He'll still bring up to this day with a certain amount of glee.
He was my ex wife's neighbor from West Park; an old taxi hack who drove for Red Top.
One day we were visiting on the sidewalk and I placed the phone call that would forever alter the course of his life.
I built up my credit with Werner and convinced THEM to put him through truck driving school.
I trekked across the country with that man for two months when it came time for someone to train him, because we weren't interested enabling another Tony.
Thanks to surviving TONY; it took me an extra month to get the rest of that two-hundred eighty hours logged behind the wheel one needs to accrue in order to finish training as a greenhorn and get issued equipment.
When it came time to get assigned my own tractor? I remember the wind in my sails further deflating.
The Freightliner regional BABY bunk was only supposed to be temporary? It's the difference between Oprah giving YOU a shed when every one else around you is getting house keys.
Rowboats aren't meant for ocean travel; station wagons make lousy campers? This thing didn't really belong east of the Rockies if you're from the west coast; perfect for Long Island only if you're actually from the eastern time zone.
Just a step up from a day cab.
A thing so cheap that the passenger seat is a glorified kitchen chair bolted to the floorboards.
Since the only seat that theoretically matters is the driver's, this is where the air ride avails itself other than what's suspending the entire passenger cabin. You can probably imagine how this butt busting detail would go over with my OWN unauthorized passenger who may or may not have snuck aboard with me.
While most operator's enjoy at least a good step and a half of room between the driver's right armrest to where your knees oughta hit begging for mercy from either your god or mistress every night - next to the bed??? This gives you full access to that fitted bottom sheet off your mattress while you're driving.
While most everybody who got trucks that day at least enjoyed living quarters with closet space; I was given a closet.
There were wardrobe hangers, don't get me wrong? They were suitcase drapes I imagine being designed by the same folks that brought us dry cleaner bags; flat vinyl envelopes that zip up along the edge. The T.V. rode either on the bed or passenger seat.
I outgrew this machine upon moving in. Even finding a permanent place to stow an atlas and the truck stop guide was ridiculous. It was literally moving into an apartment you wear like a shirt.
Using the bed as a bench and with the driver and passenger chair at each respective knee, you've got nothing to do that first day - but wait for thee bulletproof keyboard that's coil-wired through your floor to pop off and startle you with its obnoxious priority buzzer.
It's like a live action game of Perfection waiting for the timer to pop and throw everything into chaos.
Waiting for the Qualcomm to give initial marching orders on any other day can be particularly brutal, but that first assignment is torture. They could send you out immediately or they could ignore you for a week.
Guess who's shackled by the ankle to this plastic computer one could use as a bludgeoning instrument since it comes with a little heft? Not your dispatcher!
Even going to the bathroom in the office is a quick chore you don't want to dawdle at very long; you have to be able to answer the satellite at a moments notice and run like a Minuteman? When you're new??? You have no frame of reference; every hour feels like a day.
Burning calories awake merely AVAILABLE to drive is a cruel waste of resources; a perfect system would set you loose on the world fresh from the sack.
You're entire future doesn't click on until you do something work related; the longer they wait to dispatch you, the later you're night's gonna be because you're obligated to still run your entire shift if the load calls for it.
Greenhorns tend to run into trouble trying to back into black diamond experience level parking places in the middle of the night unsupervised; the only parking spots left after a certain hour for bedtime.
I lucked out and got a pretty easy assignment off the bat. It might have even already been loaded and in the same lot I was camped in since I was in a company terminal; I can't recall. But the ride took me all the way to Amarillo, Texas.
Straight up 15 to Barstow and across I-40 (if you're unfamiliar). The highway stations 98 and 99 advertise Las Vegas through the same desert Schwarzenegger tears through in the terminators.
There's quite a bit of that beige color I'm so fond of to fill the windshield well past Needles?
I tell you... I was so nervous during this trip? Guess who drove that first ten hours straight through without stopping.
The only time this guy didn't need to pee or nothing his whole shift.
Up until that day, I had company my entire life.
I was always the lower wrung of some hierarchy and taking orders. For the first time in my life, I was completely on my own and devoid of anyone's advice
The only thing to show for my existence was a blip on some dispatcher's map half across the continent. I could be stark ass naked and nobody would know a thing.
Keep in mind I didn't think the air conditioning worked until I stepped out of the vehicle to pee on the side of the road once upon this OTHER time? Picture the literal highway through Hell with pavement so hot it shimmers like a barbecue grill. So damn straight I actually have driven in just my boxers.
I remember Superbowl XXXIII assuaged my parking fears on THIS FIRST run though; I was able to serpentine into a parking spot with no problem after someone else was vacating. So in essence, we're talking about a straight line from trailer coupling to perfectly timed parking spot that first experience.
Trust me; my electronic log book would never be that perfect again.
When I walked into the driver's lounge that night to watch a historic episode of the Simpsons? It was the first time in my life it was my fault where I landed. In the Arizona desert, I was miles away from anyone I ever knew.
I've always viewed driving a big rig through the fresh snow as magical. A slay ride to a child drawn by Clydesdales the night before Christmas ... through a gas lit village.
The kind of daylight even though it's in the middle of the night “A Visit from St. Nicholas” mentions.
When tracks haven't even appeared on the freeway yet; think of a locomotive carving through the Alps as it leaves a blizzard streak in its wake. Think of how scary the slush becomes as it punishes your windshield hard and fast, because a daredevil thinks he knows better than everyone else and can't be bothered to follow. Meanwhile we're just praying we're still on pavement.
I've truly lost track of the number of rival trucks I've counted who saw fit to overtake the convoy of the logical (I usually run with) – who I see as a median garnish in less than seventeen miles from where they've passed me.
I've always sort of looked at this like I think a Sherpa would coming across a dead frozen mountain climber on Everest. Sure, there's probably a few of them piled up and their colors unfortunately appear brighter than the victims themselves.
Throwing a set of tire chains on a mountain pass in Colorado as an adult always gave me a taste of the exact same flavor I grew up sinking my teeth into sledding in Michigan.
And, not just the fun part either. You know??? Where the flakes LIE to you and swear you're cruising through outer space at warp speed?
No, I can distinctly remember (as a kid) all the crappy parts that went into the “joys” of sledding too. The part where you're barely able to climb back up the feature presentation, your feet are numb and your clothes are soaked through to the bone? I remember being paranoid over being crashed into by an uncontrolled rogue vehicle?
Of course the stakes are slightly higher on the traffic side off the shoulder of a highway dealing with metal hooks and frozen fingers. The fear's of getting slaughtered only increase magnitudes worse.
Side note; peeing on padlocks melts ice for at least a second (if you've been holding it a while) and doing this will release things if worse comes to worse.
Trust me, worse HAS become worse before.
I can literally claim surviving the same weather that killed off the Donner Party and from the same neck of the woods. Thank God for modern day conveniences.
I've actually seen shit that could shatter liquid terminators. The kind of cold that makes Mr. Abominable curse and drink an extra mug of cocoa before he haunts.
Tony taught me a lot about self sufficiency the first time I saw Parshall, Colorado?
This is the steep downgrade before you hit Vail's pass directly west of the Eisenhower - Johnson tunnel leaving Denver on 70? My first trainer hid in the sleeper berth with his wife. The dividing curtain might've been wide open, but I remember taking those bad boys on with an empty passenger seat and a clinched ass.
“Just remember what you read about driving in snow and ice in the truck driving text book. Keep her in sixth or seventh gear and stay off them jakes!”
I'd LIKE to complain about his swim or drown method of teaching, but as I recall I had a student of my own take us to Gettysburg one time through Chambersburg, Pennsylvania on the old Lincoln Highway (technically the same 30 that leads to Astoria, Oregon). We went down a 15% grade in foggy conditions at one point and I rolled over in bed to kiss the button tuck wall behind me. I think I even threw in the sign of the cross over my chest and forehead even though I'm not a catholic. I didn't hold his hand through it either.
“Just try not to kill us!”
Poor guy's eyes must have been as wide as mine were walking in the same sort of shoes.
I had some fun times teaching people how to drive, but when it got old – it got OLD.
When you're the senior partner in a team like this, everything falls squarely on your shoulders.
I can remember waking up in some pretty funky situations. You almost have to learn to be conscious even when you're not.
Once the powers that be discover you can “hot bunk”; either have the trainer or trainee sleep while the other drives – they start to run you ragged.
“No Sleep 'til Brooklyn” as a song title has always furrowed my brow a little bit more as an adult as the commandment hits me a bit differently. I've made it across country awake the whole time before straight through and it usually winds up in a buzzing headache and an argument at some point.
I've seen manlier men then I break under the pressure. I've seen what this career choice does to romantic relationships and listened as men who could double as my grandfather or John Wayne cry.
That was when I adopted the phrase, “No judgment.”
Driving had some of my brightest times, but the dark was dark.
As time progressed I managed to get ensnared by my ex. And, she was no doubt precisely where my winding key ran down.
I didn't know at the time about life force vampires, but a woman ultimately concluded that chapter of my life.
What started that first night at that truck stop in Arizona with a twinkle - ended with me (half a dozen companies later) riding back home on a Greyhound bus from Eclair, Wisconsin deflated and scared about my future.