Hello to everyone here

Hello, my name is Mike. I am 38 years old, and just a huge kid at heart. Joining this group just feels right in my gut, I have done a lot of thinking lately about my career, and what's best for the family. We do not yet have any children, though we hope to soon. I was a FedEx Express package driver for 12 years, I really enjoyed the challenge and driving those package trucks. During my last few years as a driver I went to flight school and got a job flying FedEx cargo around California. I did that for several years until I got my current job as a charter pilot operating Kingair B200 and Cessna Citation 3 jets. Even though I fly these cool aircrafts, I still can't ignore my gut feeling that eats at me everyday telling me that I know I will love driving trucks. My wife is totally cool with it when I tell her about it, and she even told me to go check out a truck school, which I did. I decided it was too expensive for something that I probably was not going to use, it did not make sense for me to leave my company which is very good and to go work for a company I knew nothing about. So, I decided to throw the dream of driving away for good. Then a month later my wife who also is a pilot took a job at a local flight school for some extra cash. As fate would have it, the owner of the flight school also owns a local tanker company. Up until this point I have never even been inside a truck, I had just giving up on ever even going for a ride inside a truck. The owner saw how excited and interested I was in his tanker business, then he asked me... Do you want to go for a ride? I could not believe it, I said hell yeah! Since that time, I went for numerous rides with an employee of his. He liked my company and gave me his personal number to let him know whenever I wanted to go. So now a few months ago I gave up the thought of ever riding in a truck, to now having a personal number of a driver who was willing to take me! He told me he and his wife thought I was crazy because I was a pilot but I loved riding in the truck. I understand that response, I mean it takes an odd person to give up a flying for a trucking job, but I am odd, that's me. Through my wife pushing me to not be so shy, I went and hung around the shop during my off days. Not long after that they set me up with a local word of mouth truck school which I went and passed, the school was free to me. The tanker company supplies the school I went to with fuel and they get behind on their payments often, but the tanker company continues to supply them because it's the right thing to do, according to the boss. Since the school is so grateful for the tanker to keep them operating, they offered to let me go there for free. I gave a nice tip to the instructor for preparing me enough to pass first attempt. I know this is long, I am sorry. I am just really excited. Now for the reason I will switch to this tanker job by April of next year. My wife is from Taiwan and we want to go visit 3 months a year. I can't do this with my current job, it's just not possible, I have tried. I talked to the owner of the tankers a few days ago about our plan. He is totally cool with us taking 3 months off a year to visit Taiwan. This guy is the real deal, he is super honest and everyone loves him. I can't thank him enough for giving me the opportunity to ride in a truck, learn how to drive one, and offer me a job. It is a mon-fri local day cab gig. Anyways, that's my life story. Hopefully at least a few of you guys will be supportive. Thanks for hanging in there!

 

For sure, she is the best! And thank you, sir!

 

Thanks, I appreciate that. What did you pass up?

 

This site is refreshing, seeing truck drivers treat each other with respect. I joined a couple groups on Facebook and those guys are animals toward each other, it almost made me not go through with it. I hope some dream opportunity comes your way soon!