Trucking can be like a bad marriage...

Sometimes I think younger truck drivers can really feel alienated out here...
Culturaly cut off...

Younger people have one vibe, older people have another...expecially if your metropolitan young....

Sometimes if your younger...you just want to meet someone who 'gets' your generation....

For whatever reason...trucking just doesn't attract young people...people under 30...

In a way, I can see why...when your young and still have your 'game on'...the last thing you want is to be seperated from the 'action'...I guess...

but the drivers from 1940-1970, they all started off young...

But now days...people come to trucking as a second or third career...or when all else fails scenerio...when they can't get hired no where else...

When I pull up into a truck stop...I hardly ever see young people...

Except for moving van companies...for some reason moving trucking companies attract the young and agile..



Maybe cause of all the physical work involved...

Other than that...all or most of the other drivers I see look older and very uninsterested in what's going on around them...

And that's probablly what companies prefer...people who are beyond their sexual prime...that way they get in less mischief out here...

It's a lonely life out here for a young person...at least now days...

 

Ahh, this is neat...I use to have a friend, who was from Montana...at the time we both worked for Werner Enterprise...

Talk about young...this guy was about the same age you were when he first started...he was petite, cute, and looked like he was 16 or 15...infact, when we first met...I asked him 'Are you out here with your Dad' (at a Werner terminal)..

And to my suprise, he was like 'No, I drive for Werner'...

And from that point on, we hit it off...actually...we departed...no contact info at all...but believe it or not...we met again at a shipper in Kentucky...after that we exchanged numbers...and gave each other comfort out here...

And we talked about the same things...being out of our social setting...it saddened us greatly...but at the time, still had enough love for trucking to justify it...

So we would gab on the phone like girls,



gossiping about all the parties and or events we thought we we're missing out on...If it weren't for him, I don't know how I would of made it through some of those times...
I haven't spoken with him for some time though...
He finally ended up finding a girlfriend...but sadly, she passed away...she was addicted to pain pills and such...I met her once...so tragic...anyways..

Over the years, that I drove, I've tried everything to ease the loneliness...pets...(I once had a miniture Pincher and a rabbit, they both rode with me)...had a cat once...allergies made me get rid of it...

The sad thing is...by being out here, you fail to form that essential social base...so when you go back home or to wherever...your kind of left in a social void...others have moved on, and we forever missed out...

That's why I tend to sometimes 'act out'...and partly why I'm the 'ghostchild'...cause I left alot of my youth or hey day years, out there on the road...

And I now refuse to grow old without a fight...I refuse to loose my personality and spirit and become some emotionaless coffee drinking road dog...Infact...I out right rebel against that...

I use to post crazy photos of myself on here, just to stand out...just to do things people my age (at the time) would be doing anyways...

I refused to hide or snuff my creative artsy side and become invisible..

I no longer post those wild crazy photos, cause at the time admin asked me to stop...and it became contriversial...

Some people fail to see the colorful metaphor of 'Trucking can be like a bad marriage'...

They think it has to do with being gay or something...it doesn't...it's simply theater...(The ultimate reality show, brought to you by real truckers and our experiences, we experience the pain and joy, and share it with you, the world, the public)



And that's what I mean about generation gap...

Your younger, and therefore you 'get it'....
It's simply a colorful way to deal with a often stressful lifestyle...no more, no less...it's theater,(based on real life day to day experiences) and good for the nerves...

Anyways...so glad you chimed in...feel free to share any other stories you may have...someone, somewhere, will find comfort in them...

 

U4EA...

Thanks...and I like the way you write too....

It's basically just being 'honest'...that's all it really is...

It's not trying to make the situation more or less than what it is...

Kinda like Al Bundy in 'Married with Children'...it was kind of a self degridating satirical view of marriage or married life...



And as you described above, many elements of OTR driving can indeed be self degridating...I mean certain lifestyle patterns can be, and often formed...that can be harmful to the soul...in many ways...

But I must emphasis to the casual reader...that not all of trucking is like that, nor is everyones experience the same...

To many, trucking is like a short fling...a fast quick easy 'sexual affair'...their in it, than out of it...then move on....

And yet to others, it's a life long love filled ambition and desire...and the first date is as sweet as the last...

So I must be fair to the casual reader by emphasizing not everyones experience with trucking is the same...it varies greatly...

For some...trucking is a great marriage...

And it was for me, at one time...my problem is...I stayed with it to long...someone like me can't do one thing to long...or I get bored...after boredom comes dispair...and then saddness...and then regret...

And then one day you wake up, and your laying next to this big hairy creature..



Your in bed with it, and your like 'What am I doing here?!'...

It didn't alway appear this way though...for years earlier...either to not wanting to face reality, or a kind of a spell being cast upon you...it appeared quite different...

But by now it has economic and circumstancial power over you...in that...you've driven for so long that you failed to develop meaningful other 'marketable job skills'...and so to now re enter the job market...it would be like getting out of highschool again...

Also, as you mentioned above, because you've been so obcessed with this creature, you've neglected other social aspects of your life...so after a while, there's really nothing to return to...all that you wanted to or could have returned to in the past, is now a distant memory...faded and gone...

Many times you've tried to leave in the past...half naked and barefoot, just to find a harsh reality waiting for you outside of the castle...

Your barefoot...there's thorns and rocks on the road way...the hairy beast has done it's best to keep you by it's side and keep you from going elsewhere...(bad daq report, messed up credit if you tried that leaseing stuff, unpolished demeanor and grooming habits, formed while being on the road ect ect)...

You soon find doors closing all around you......as if the beast has telepathed to the world that you were once married to it...and as such no one want's anything to do with you...

So sadly...cold, helpless, humilated...you turn around and head back towards the castle with the beast inside...and it's waiting for you...

'Fill out application...10 year work history, 3 days orientation, no pets, no riders, must stay out for 21 days at a time...we own you'...

And as soon as you walk inside the door, the beast hugs you, smoothers you, and gets you wet...And your like 'get off of me'...
But in a wierd odd strange way...your back in a eerily firmiluar enviornment...you know where the kitchen is, the bathroom, even the bedroom, (which you try to avoid)...so now that your back home...(recently rehired) you relax for a few days...and then it's business as usual as the beast demands of you, it's spouse, to start cooking and cleaning....



and scrubbing and waxing...it rides you all day long...and is relentless...
And once again, you begin planning your escape...

Trucking indeed can be like a bad marriage...

 

Last week I railed against the intrusion of electronic logs..(on previous page)...and how I felt they greatly intruded on a drivers privacy...and dreaded the day they would be mandated...

Well lo and behold...I was chosen, by the company I work for, for a test trial of 'Turnpike'...the company that engineers electronic logs...

Yes, I was approached yesterday, without reason or warning...that I would be the 'test pilot' of this device...



It's a device that plugs into your diagnostic inlet on the driver side floor panel...

(Pet peeve: Ok, why do drivers have to back up next to you so that their window is exactly parrellel to yours?...it feels kind of intrusive when they do that...like someone looking inside your bedroom window or something...like sharing space with someone you've only seen for 3.8 seconds...and then they start looking over at you....well why not just jump in the truck with me then, and let's have a picnik?? good gracious)

Anyways..back to the theme...
This device comes with a hand held 'Blackberry'...it is the control module for the logs and looks just like this..



But it's not configured to be used as a phone...
I was volunteered to try out this stuff....probablly because, despite what some on here may think of me, in real life, while on the job, I project a real 'can do' attitude...a 'on time' attitude...as such, my employer has confidence in me to figure this stuff out and then teach it to others...

A few concerns I have about this device...

1. For one, it uses a Blackberry key pad...these devices come with cameras and speakers...two way speakers mind you...

Now even though they say neither function is utilized for the logs...we all know by now that every thing electronic can be over riden by the person behind the key pad...a simple instruction program could activate the camera and or two way speaker...thereby breaching your privacy...my privacy...

2. And two...Admin can at times become so obscessed with monitoring stats from the truck, that they forget trucking is still very much a mood driven activity...
You cannot remove the human element from driving, and drivers don't always drive according to 'logic'...but rather real time biological dictates....

Computers don't get tired or drowsy, computers don't have feelings, or families, that effect mood, which can sometimes drain you...computers don't feel emotional highs and or lows, nor do computors get headaches or the flu...all which effect ones driving style for the day...

I've also told this to the owner of the truck I drive...that although I guess I don't mind being monitored 24/7....in the end, I'm the one doing the driving...and will not take kindly to being crotiqued on a daily basis on how I can conserve fuel here and there and this and that...

Cause then I'll be like...'Well then you drive it or hire a robot'....

I'm not a robot...and need to make that clear to them...

Well, I guess in the end...they got me...I am like the parolee with the electronic bracelet around their ankle, being monitored 24/7...



Just as I compared it to on the previous page, just days ago...funny how it all came true...

And pretty soon, we will all be wearing these, so to speak, around our precious little ankles...as the beast (industry) we are married to, clamps down ever tighter and tighter...
Indeed, trucking can be like a bad marriage...

 

Well ye, just like with any new marriage...you run away with it at first...the first 6 months is like a honey moon, lot's of love makeing and whatever...
You plan to be together for the rest of your lives...and make decisions that reflect that...maybe buying a house or property out in the middle of nowhere...maybe neglecting to take college classes on line...maybe neglecting your family, friends, ect ect...
Cause in the beggining...all you need is your indepence and truck...your big shiny humungious truck, that your so proud of...you love it, and it loves you...what else do ya need....

Fast forward 2-3 years later...your with your 4th company, that house or property you purchased in the middle of no where...you can't ever be there to enjoy it, cause you must make payments, and there's no jobs or industry nearby to be had...so you must continue to drive or default on house...

And you've failed to make new friends, so therefore you have no 'network system' to get inside info on who's hiring...
(networking through friends and associates is the number one way people get good jobs)

But because you drive and are away, your never at the right events or functions to meet the 'insiders' who could hook you up...

I volunteered my time at a air show one Saturday...and during that 8 hour event, I met pilots, engineers, aviation managers...I met so many people who I clicked with...and got a card from one...

I met more new people in 8 hours than I do in trucking in 6 months...I mean people who could actually help me move up...

But the sad thing is, do to work schedual...I haven't seen any of them sense...

The trucking schedual can be selfish...and wants you all to itself...



You work for me, and only me...I will share you with no one...your married to me, and no one else...
I will come before your friends, family, your lover...your hobbies, even sometimes church...I'm very monolithic...I demand all of you...I want all of you...24/7....I want you to sleep with me every night, to wash me, and to polish me...
I will even make you miss out on birthdays, holidays, and any other special event you have planned...
Your married to me, and me alone...

So like most people, humans, we adapt...and get use to the treatment...and some even make it work for them...

More power to those who can and do...

 

The manager at the Pilot truck stop practically shoves two corn dogs down my throat...



He came over, while I was contimplating on what to buy...(as you know I have resentment towards Pilots and their corn dogs)...

I'm like 'Can I just get one?
He's like 'Get two....their good, you can handle it'...

He's like 'If I can eat them, you can'...

I don't know if he was trying to clean out inventory or what...but he was like a used car salesman trying to sell me corndogs...



I was tickled by his efforts, started laughing, and gave in...

And now once again I feel guilty...I always say...eating junk food is like having cheap fast sex on a Friday night, you rush into it, but after words, feel bad....

I need to stay away from these things...they will be the end of me...