What A Great Experience

I read all the forums on here and did as much research that I could then I finally made my move. I contacted a swift recruiter and my new journey began. I went down to the dmv and took my cdl test and got my permit, contacted my recruiter and she set up my bus tickets and hotel room for Millington. To be honest with you, I was nervous as hell. I never took a journey by myself like this before but my wife and kids gave me all the support I needed. The hardest part of this whole thing was sitting on that first bus watching my family standing on the sidewalk crying and waving good-bye and asking myself if i'm really ready to do this. The bus ride from Florida to Millington was the longest ride i've ever been on, not knowing where i'm going or what i'm gonna be doing and being by myself was the loneliest feeling I ever experienced. I arrived at the memphis bus station and a swift shuttle came by and picked me up and took me to the hotel in Millington. I got my room number and when I finally found the room then I learned I had 3 other roommates. We all introduced ourselves and come to find out they all were just as nervous as me. We had to be up and ready to be picked up at 5:30 am at the front of the hotel. The shuttle came and took us for our physicals, there was 13 students total. The first day was just physicals, urine test, blood pressure, hernia, squat, bend, cough and signing papers. Nothing to bad but it took the whole day to do everybody. We ended up losing one of our roommates due to a pre existing breathing problem. Then we were shuttled back to the hotel. The next couple of days was class room stuff, learning how to do log books, map reading etc... Then we headed to the driving range. Did straight line backing, alley docking, serpentine, parallel parking, off set and pre trips. I passed all my tests and only spent two weeks in Millington then I was bused to Ocala, FL for my driving training. This bus ride wasnt to bad, one of my Millington roommates was from FL to so that gave me somebody to talk to. We were set up at the Howard Johnsons and were still roommates. I live about 3 hours away, so my family showed up at the bus station and we spent the day together which was exactly what I needed, since I missed christmas with the family. The next day we were picked up and taken to the Ocala terminal and started driving training. Since we only went from first gear to reverse in Millington I had no idea how to double clutch so needless to say my first day I grinded the hell out of those gears but the second day was much smoother. I spent a week doing driving training then went for my dot test and passed, now I had my new class A CDL. I got to go home for a week then went back to Ocala for 3 days of orientation and got coded. Went back home for 3 days until my new mentor called me. The next day I was back on the bus heading to Ocala again, hoping this guy wasnt gonna be a dick. I read a lot of horror stories about mentors. This time my mentor picked me up and took me to Chiefland, FL for the night. I stayed in the truck in the wal mart parking lot and he went home. The next morning he showed up and we were off to start the next journey. I spent the next 6 weeks living in the truck with him and he was actually pretty cool. I felt I was getting some good experience driving with him. He does all 48 and we hit 33 of them. I've been in the snow, ice, fog, crossed the rocky mountains, smokey mountains, appalachian mountains and every other freaken mountain there is. Learned about ice as I was sliding through a pilot parking lot ######## my pants thinking I was gonna crash his truck but luckily we stopped about 3 feet from the other tractor. I just finished my 240 drive hours and my 40 back ups and got to come home for a week. I called Ocala today and was told my truck will be ready for Monday. I'm excited and ready to start my next journey solo. Aside from my family life, this has got to be one of the greatest journeys I ever experienced and I have nothing but good things to say about swift so far. They handled all my lodging and transportation and all of the instructors i've meet have been great. If anybody has any questions just ask and I can tell you whatever I know.