Hello from Maine

Hello, All
New to site but I have been driving for 12 years with locally owned companys out of Maine. Another fellow co-worker/driver from work keeps talking about buying a truck and doing his own loads so I thought I would do some of my own research and found this site. not sure if buying my own truck is what I really want to do just cause the fact that I am a husband and a father of 3 kids and cant stand the fact of being gone for weeks at time. So my goal in research here is to see if there is some local loads out of maine or in the New England area to not keep me out every night of the week (not asking for someone loads here) just basicly looking to see what other fellow drivers who own there own trucks would offer up there experience and lead me in the right direction on buying trucks what to buy what not to buy how much to spend for first truck do I need to buy a trailer were to get the best insurance you know so on and so on Thanks Mike