Trucking is Distracting.
I’m an easily distracted writer. Six years into my chosen career of truck driving and I finally have enough thoughts assembled to complete my first book. That is, if I ever can find the time. It can be frustrating, to have the mind of a writer dwelling in the body of a truck driver, but until writing pays more than trucking, this is the arrangement I am stuck with. I hold confidence that one day; with a little luck and a lot of effort on my part, a balance shall be struck. It wouldn’t bring a single tear to my eyes if I became a writer and truck driving was a thing of the past.
As much as I’m committed to spending the dark and dreary days of winter finishing the book, things (namely, life) keep getting in the way. Take for instance that angry Policeman in Framingham, Massachusetts that I wrote about in my previous story. I didn’t need, or want, a story to just come about like that. I guess I could have sat in a smoky bar and told some friends about a mean Police Officer I ran into, but that’s not my style. Instead, I tell the world, and even send a copy to the offending Officer’s department, with hopes that Officer Meanie can see how his treatment made me feel. Writing is both my curse and my blessing; I not only told the story about my encounter with the meanest Officer in the entire Northeast, but in the telling, it somehow evolved into my previous misfortunes (and the resulting lessons) from being arrested for possession of Marijuana! An interesting side note: two weeks and two days after I published that story, my company had me go for a “random” drug test, which I was glad to take as I knew I would (and did) pass!
This is why I think I’ll like book writing more than I like writing stories here- writing these is like being under a self-imposed deadline and sometimes I post them before my mind has finished contemplating all I wanted to say. For instance, with that last story I forgot one of the most important parts. While it may have made an entertaining read to everyone, I forgot to mention that my younger readers (especially my own children) should not miss the major underlying lesson: don’t try the stunts I pulled off in my younger years-of-bad-decisions. I was lucky and came dangerously close to ending up in jail than I would have liked to. Try this in your own life and you might not be so lucky. I’m ill-prepared, both mentally and financially, to hire Attorneys for myself, or for anyone else.
Writing in a blog is like a having a girlfriend, writing a book is like having a Wife. I might give my Girlfriend only minimal amounts of time when I want something; in the same way I might write something to get it off my mind and into the world. My book is more like a Wife in the sense that’s it mine for as long as I pay it the proper attention. I can write a chapter and hold onto it, until I am sure that’s it ready and complete. I can move from one chapter to the next and back again if I forget something. I want to get it right as much as I want to get my physical marriage to my real life Wife right. When my book goes from mind to paper, editor to publisher, our marriage will finally be complete. All I need is time. And darn trucking always gets in the way.
I keep telling myself, “no more girlfriends, focus on the Wife and get this book done”, and then something comes up. I don’t like how life can be so interesting that it possesses the power to distract me so easily. I don’t want to have to write stories about random events, but I can’t help it. I’m going to give it a shot though. Heck, I’m so distracted that I even have put the trailer before the truck: I’ve spent too much time searching for an agent (or even figuring out if I need one) before I hold anything in my hands to show them. “Focus Jason,” is my new mantra of choice.
So focus, I will. It’s going to be hard but I will. Even though trucking always gets in the way, I’ll have to use a sizable amount of my free time to “get-er-done.” There are weekends and there are evenings (however rare) when trucking has not completely exhausted my mind, body, and soul. There is even the occasion where I have a two-day trip; I’m usually finished up early in the day and have enough time to bang a chapter or two out. There’s even the one-day trip that turns into a two-day trip out of pure circumstance. I had one of these (or so I thought) in the final week leading up to Thanksgiving.
There’s nothing like the “Thanksgiving rush.” Allow me to explain: the majority of furniture buyers are in fact, Women. Women like to wait to the last minute, which is why they are rarely on time for anything. As much as I love them, this creates hassles within my life right down to the way it affects my job. Usually right around mid-November, an entire gaggle of Women decide they need new dining room tables and sofas for their guests to enjoy. So they rush to their nearest furniture store and place their order with the stipulation that they “want it now.” Fortunately for them, when they pick our wonderful products at my company for their purchase, we can usually accommodate them. Everyone from the people in our warehouse, to our planning office personnel and everyone else in between, right down to our drivers, works like mad to make it happen. Sometimes, it makes my head hurt.
Monday of Thanksgiving week was unusually relaxing; I had six very easy stops sprinkled across lovely upstate New York and had just enough time to make it back home before my working hours expired for the day. My concern driving home was the day was so relaxing that it might have been like the calm before the storm. I was right.
Somewhere between Cobleskill, New York, and our home base in Leesport, Pa, I made the call to see what was next on my menu. One of my dispatchers told me, “We have you on thirteen stops, starting in Laurel, Maryland and ending in Laurel, Maryland for tomorrow. They are not all in Laurel, but do what you can and keep us updated.” I hung up the phone, picked up my rather solid Mag-Lite flashlight off the floor next to my drivers seat and slammed it against my skull, just to see if I was having a bad dream. It hurt. It wasn’t a dream. “Oh well,” I told myself, “as long as there aren’t any stops in D.C. it might just be doable.”
When I arrived back at our wonderful gated community in Leesport, I was horrified to see there was not one, but two stops in D.C. The rest were sprinkled around the Capitol Beltway where traffic can be a never-ending nightmare on a good day. As much as I love the people in my planning office, I couldn’t help but let out a sigh as I wondered if they are subject to the same random drug testing that I am. I also thought of the two choices that lay before me.
My first choice involves a little trick that I always keep in my back pocket for trips as unappetizing as this and it’s a pure “for emergency use only” type of tactic that I seriously considered putting to use. It’s a rather simple plan that involves going to the nearest Chinese restaurant, diving into the dumpster behind it and then eating all the discarded, days old scraps of food I can find. After that, I just have to wait for morning and the resulting pain (and eruptions from various parts of the body) before I call in to work and say “Argh- I think I ate some bad Chinese yesterday and I can’t possibly make it into work!”
My second option - which is also the one I ended up going with – was to go on the trip even though I knew it would probably turn into a two-day trip. Running around the beltway in an eighteen wheeler with thirteen stops on the menu can be as painful as eating bad Chinese, but on the bright side, I’d probably have some time to catch up on writing in between days one and two. Besides, thirteen stops pays pretty darn good -making it a pure “What doesn’t kill you makes you richer” scenario.
I should mention, even though I like to write and someday hope to make it my “bill paying” profession, I’m keenly aware that being a truck driver is what pays the bills now and as such, planned on doing what I could to finish this trip in one day. Heck, a lot of unprepared women were waiting on the items stuffed within my trailer. I’m also a smart enough man to know it’s never good to disappoint a woman, including our customers and the ones that reside within our planning office, so off I went!
Pre-trip inspection done and prayers said, I departed Leesport at six thirty Tuesday morning, an hour later than I should have, nonetheless as legally as I could have.. One hour behind schedule right off the bat. Interstate 83 and 695 around Baltimore was unexpectedly smooth sailing. Then I got to 95, which was at a standstill because a couple cars got tangled up and ended up smashed on both shoulders. The road was open but people have to take a look at the aftermath of such an incident for reasons I’ll never understand. Another half hour goes up in smoke at right about the same time my first customer calls me wondering where I am.
Don’t get me wrong, I love our customers because they keep us in business and put food on the table, but it can be a huge distraction when they call wondering where I am. Sometimes I have no idea how they got my number or how they even knew that I was the lucky duck bringing them presents. There I am, driving along thinking of things that often have nothing to do with the road (or day) ahead of me and “ring, ring, ring”. I’m brought back to reality because of annoying technology that is the cell phone. If that’s not bad enough, sometimes the customers strike a tone that suggests I spent my morning on the porch of my palatial mansion, soaking in the hot-tub while smoking a cigar before finally arising from the water and wrapping my body in a ten-million thread count cotton robe with a yawn and saying, “ahh, guess I’ll meander over to work now.” Little do they know the truth is often that I left my palatial mansion (that lacks a hot-tub) at a painfully dark hour, and I often struggle more than Santa Claus while trying to get to them as quickly as my little eighteen wheels will carry me.
Enough with my customer distractions, let’s get back to my day from heck:
A few customers move in a manner that suggests they think I am there only for them and have nowhere else to go today. One customer, who also doubles as a store manager, informs me, “I’m going to change clothes real quick, I’ll be right back” before disappearing for ten minutes. The back of my head begins to feel like someone is sticking ten thousand little needles in it. Somewhere around three thirty in the afternoon I realize I haven’t had any food since a Hot Pocket at six in the morning. Things were not looking favorable for me to finish this up before customers started closing for the day. I wondered why I just didn’t go with my “Bad Chinese” plan.
Surprisingly, my two stops in the “always traumatic” District of Columbia went off without a hitch sans the ten million traffic lights making it the usual slow go. By five thirty in the evening I was en route to my second to last stop with my head hurting so bad that it felt like the ten-thousand needles had been upgraded to small nails. The pain, even when trying not to move my head was terrible, was just strong enough to make me forget I never had the time to eat any food. My Advil bottle was empty but I was not completely out of luck, if I somehow managed to get this second-to-last stop off in a timely fashion, I could still make my last stop back in Laurel because they were open to 7, but willing to wait until 8, if I could make it by then.
The second to last stop is a real pickle during normal hours, and I was real concerned how this less than truck-friendly shopping center might look this late in the evening. As I pulled in, it was way worse than even I anticipated. Every turn, from off of the main road to every turn thereafter, requires a lot of prayer and even more luck. The prayer comes in handy in hoping that I swung wide enough to make the corners and the luck comes in that no cars enter the intersections where I will be turning. Prayer wasn’t helping and luck was absent on this journey. The shopping center was jam packed beyond belief and it took ten minutes just navigating through the parking lot before I was able to set myself up to back behind the shopping center to the customer’s delivery area. It’s a pain in the ass on a normal day; backing in behind the building is done by swinging the trailer to my right on the side I can’t see, also known as the dreaded blind-side backing. I have to get out a few thousand times to get it just right but tonight there’s an added element of surprise. The space along side the shopping center is tight enough, but at this late hour there is an entire row of parked cars taking up the space I require to get back there. But I try.
It quickly becomes evident that the last two cars (at the minimum) must be moved to make this work, and God knows where the owners are or when they’ll return. I have reached my limit. I’m ready to throw in the towel; I call the customer (who I quite like by the way) to explain what’s happening. I tell them there are cars everywhere. They say maybe they can get them moved. I say it’s impossible, there are too many. They tell me they are coming; they’ll see what they can do. I think, “I’ve had enough. I’m going to get a hotel, some Advil, some food, (in that order) and come back in the morning.”
As I wait, a lady appears from around the corner and starts walking in my direction, where I sit frustrated beyond all belief, in my truck, right next to the first two cars that need moved. She walks over to me and asks me, in broken English, what I am doing. I half want to answer her, “I’ve been wondering that myself.” She is pretty in the face with alluring eyes, but after I explain multiple times what I am trying to do (including how these cars need moved) she keeps asking the same question, in a manner that suggests I think it’s fun to randomly park a tractor-trailer this late in the evening, alongside a building, because I have nothing better to do. I may as well have been wearing an Elvis-like T-shirt that said, “Jason has left the body” because I uncharacteristically raised my voice and one more time tried to explain “Lady, I need these cars moved so I can back this truck behind this building!” She looked at me with a quizzical look upon her face, then gave up and walked away, to the very first car that was in my way. To my utter amazement, she hopped in and drove it away.
I was within seconds from shifting from reverse to third gear and driving myself to the safety of a hotel, the relief of Advil, and the comforts of some nourishment, when the customer appeared. With his help watching my back, and with the lady of ten thousand repetitive questions freeing up just enough space, I was able to finally back my truck up and finish the delivery. With my head hurting like it’s never hurt in my life, I made a mad (but safe) dash for my final stop of the trip. This customer gave me great directions but I was still relieved to see him outside along the road, waving his arms in the air wildly, clearing marking where I was to turn into his driveway. Ten minutes later, at seven fifteen in the evening, a miracle had been performed. The trip from Hell had been completed in one day. It was nine hours from first stop to last stop, and it wasn’t any fun, but I did my job. I didn’t have enough time to make it back to Leesport, but I didn’t care. There was a truck stop 10 minutes away where I could get a shower, some Advil, and of course, food. First I called in empty and learned I was already dispatched on five stops for the next day from Oxford Pa to Malvern Pa. Seemed like an easy load but I didn’t even care to think about it- I just wanted to be parked, showered, fed, and then off to sleep.
I pulled into the truck stop and was halfway amused to see a single open parking space, right near the main entrance to the building. “Wow,” I thought, “the universe might actually like me again!” Within seconds, the truck was parked and my microwave was micro-waving a Stauffer’s Turkey and filling dinner, which I promptly enjoyed. That meal was followed by a supreme pizza Hot Pocket, followed later by two bowls of cereal. I went inside and purchased some Extra Strength Tylenol (only $6.80 for 24, what a deal!), got a shower and finally, went to my truck where I could do what I wanted to do for so many hours: lie down on a flat surface. My mind, body, and soul were in no shape to write, so I did the next best thing: I read.
What I picked to read was interesting as well as oddly comforting. A couple of Sundays ago, I bought a Wall Street Journal, the most of which has long been discarded. I kept the Magazine inside of it, named appropriately enough: The Wall Street Journal Magazine. I held onto to it because there were several items inside of it I thought I should read, amazing things like how to buy a helicopter, how to buy vintage cars, rare wines and even estate jewelry. I never felt the need to buy any of these things, but if you told me ten years ago that I would be a truck driver, I never would have believed you. Along those same lines, even though I don’t anticipate buying those things, I can’t be sure that I never will be in the market for them and hence my reasoning for holding onto the magazine.
Oddly, as I lay down in my comfortable upstairs truck bed, I didn’t go to those articles. I became fixated on one I did not see until that night. It was an article about a married couple, both of which are authors. His name is Martin Amis, and apparently he is a famous British Novelist, whom I have never had heard of. That’s the thing about great writers, as good as they may be, half the population (perhaps more) has never heard of them. Tragic really. Martin’s Wife Isabel is equally fascinating. I was grateful for a look into a couple of real life writer’s lives and a getting a glimpse of how they think and interact with other, as well as with the world.
Martin’s Father was also a novelist and he recalls his Father in the study, hard at work and used the terminology “more or less hermetically sealed off in there.” Interesting - sounds like me, when I’m at home and in our upstairs bedroom cut off from the rest of the family. He speaks of his desire for the quiet life and how conflict “breaks his concentration.” Really? He should try delivering five loads (on average) of furniture in a tractor-trailer every week! He says he’s not terribly social; either am I! I don’t even like people! I don’t like them in a bad way, only when they blow their horns at me, clog up the roads in front of me, or jump off of buses, in hordes, and create people-jams in the restrooms at service plazas as I’m trying to take care of an intestinal emergency.
In a sense, writers are solitary people and that’s what I like best about my job as a truck driver: I can be alone with my thoughts; but the people, other than our more fun-to-see customers, can be a distraction. This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes by another writer, Charles Bukowski. When asked if he hates people he replied, “I don’t hate them, I just feel better when they’re not around.” My sentiments exactly; I’d have the best job in the world if I was the only vehicle on the road, the only person in line at a food counter, or I if had an Easy Button to hit when arriving at a difficult delivery, be it with difficult people or difficult truck parking logistics.
I found Martin’s Wife Isabel equally fascinating. She is beautiful and perhaps out of Martin’s league had he been an ordinary citizen and not a famous novelist, not unlike my situation with my Wife. I’m not famous (nor do I desire to be) but sometimes I think my Wife only hangs on in the off chance I do become a successful writer. I say “writer” and not “novelist” because I’ve never figured out how to make up a story, let alone successfully tell it.
A quote Isabel spoke during the story struck a chord with me: “Sometimes I worry I’ve only published two books- two and a half if you count the one about my brother- and I’m 49. I get worried about time. Will there be time?”
I worry about time all the time myself. She at least has two published books under her belt and I if knew her personally I might suggest she stop her whining and count her blessings. But I know where she is coming from - since we live in a world where the next day is never guaranteed, my hope is nothing happens to me that would prevent me from at least finishing my noble attempt at that first book. Her worries about time somehow made me reflect on the evolution of my own mind over time. When I was in my youth, I used to think, “If I could just share a bed with two women, at the same time, then I could die a happy man, at any time.” These days I am more likely to think, “If I could just complete this book, then I could die a happy man, whenever that day shall come, but I hope it’s not too soon because I could probably write a second book.”
I don’t really believe that because I saw similarities between this wonderful couple and myself that it automatically makes me a successful writer-to-be. For all I know, the traits that I believe might make me a good writer might also qualify me as a certified psychopath. There’s only one-way to find out, and that is to refer back to my mantra: “Focus Jason. Focus.”
But I do consider myself more goal-oriented than the average truck driver. Multiple Scientific studies have shown that when truck drivers are asked where they plan to be in ten years, 3 out of 5 replied “dunno, holding this steering wheel?” I like my steering wheel quite a lot, thank-you very much, but it’s never been my plan to at least not try making more of my life.
In the name of finishing this writing, allow me to re-focus and finish it up.
The next morning after reading that article about the famous novelists (who surely must aspire to be me) I awoke refreshed and boogied back to Pennsylvania where I hoped set record time doing the old switch-a-roo with trailers and hit the pike again. I skipped food since the following day was Thanksgiving, and I also dodged one phone call and one person, each trying to give me a turkey. I wanted to get going so I could get home as early as possible on Thanksgiving eve, so off I went.
I wasn’t on the road ten minutes when the phone rang; I looked at the number and thought it originated from our yard – the one I just left - so I ignored it, thinking it may be yet another person trying to pawn off a dead frozen bird. Ten minutes later, while lazily cruising south on Interstate 176 towards the PA Turnpike, I checked the voicemail left from the call in question.
It was our money lady back in Leesport. She gets my trip packets when there is money involved, and the trip from hell contained quite a few checks. She didn’t have any dead birds to offer, only words of admonishment regarding my trip from hell on the prior day:
“Jason, I sure hope you’re not training. I hope the new guy knows that every bill-of-lading needs to be signed, and you had quite a few that were not, from yesterday’s load. I just wanted to get on your case about that.”
I hung up the phone and wondered if she is in fact, insane. Does she know who she’s dealing with? Does she know that I am a writer-in-my-own-mind and could spin an entire story out of her voicemail? If the Cop up in Framingham was to be considered a victim of mine, she’s next in line!
The truth of the matter is that the trailer sits post-tripped and empty back in Leesport. The only memory I have of the day was the pain in my head as I tried my best to get every customer their stuff, on the day promised, and I was successful (just barely) in my attempt. Sure, I know every page of every bill-of-lading needs to be signed and I always pay attention to that. Somehow, during the most uncomfortable day I have ever experienced in my five years with the company, I slipped up and missed one (or two.) Notice she didn’t say anything about missing COD checks; I paid proper attention to the really important stuff!
By the way, I happened to run into her the other morning while strolling through our offices and she asked me if I got her “nasty-o-gram,” her words, not mine.
“Yes I did. And I don’t train any more.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m too old. I retired from it.”
She brought up the unsigned paperwork again before adding, “Perhaps you should retire entirely if you can’t do the job right.”
“I’m working on it.”
She may have thought those words “I’m working on it,” were just words falling out of my mouth, but I assure you, they were said with conviction. As much as I love my job, its little moments like these that I’ll never miss if I am ever successful in my journey to be a writer. And I sure won’t miss getting up at a painfully dark hour. Or not eating all day. Or the rare times when I get the “ten-thousand-little-needles-in-my-head” feeling. Writing to me is a much more comfortable job than bouncing down the highway in an eighteen-wheeler.
Where was I? That money lady in Leesport got me distracted! Darn Her!
Oh yes, I was en route on my Thursday evening six drop load and I had just listened to her voicemail. I hung up the phone, shook my head and started thinking happy thoughts again. Ten minutes later the phone rang again, a call from our headquarters in Wisconsin, so I answered it immediately.
It was one of my dispatchers: “Your first stop is wondering where you are….they’d like an ETA………”
What?
What was I saying?
As much as I’m committed to spending the dark and dreary days of winter finishing the book, things (namely, life) keep getting in the way. Take for instance that angry Policeman in Framingham, Massachusetts that I wrote about in my previous story. I didn’t need, or want, a story to just come about like that. I guess I could have sat in a smoky bar and told some friends about a mean Police Officer I ran into, but that’s not my style. Instead, I tell the world, and even send a copy to the offending Officer’s department, with hopes that Officer Meanie can see how his treatment made me feel. Writing is both my curse and my blessing; I not only told the story about my encounter with the meanest Officer in the entire Northeast, but in the telling, it somehow evolved into my previous misfortunes (and the resulting lessons) from being arrested for possession of Marijuana! An interesting side note: two weeks and two days after I published that story, my company had me go for a “random” drug test, which I was glad to take as I knew I would (and did) pass!
This is why I think I’ll like book writing more than I like writing stories here- writing these is like being under a self-imposed deadline and sometimes I post them before my mind has finished contemplating all I wanted to say. For instance, with that last story I forgot one of the most important parts. While it may have made an entertaining read to everyone, I forgot to mention that my younger readers (especially my own children) should not miss the major underlying lesson: don’t try the stunts I pulled off in my younger years-of-bad-decisions. I was lucky and came dangerously close to ending up in jail than I would have liked to. Try this in your own life and you might not be so lucky. I’m ill-prepared, both mentally and financially, to hire Attorneys for myself, or for anyone else.
Writing in a blog is like a having a girlfriend, writing a book is like having a Wife. I might give my Girlfriend only minimal amounts of time when I want something; in the same way I might write something to get it off my mind and into the world. My book is more like a Wife in the sense that’s it mine for as long as I pay it the proper attention. I can write a chapter and hold onto it, until I am sure that’s it ready and complete. I can move from one chapter to the next and back again if I forget something. I want to get it right as much as I want to get my physical marriage to my real life Wife right. When my book goes from mind to paper, editor to publisher, our marriage will finally be complete. All I need is time. And darn trucking always gets in the way.
I keep telling myself, “no more girlfriends, focus on the Wife and get this book done”, and then something comes up. I don’t like how life can be so interesting that it possesses the power to distract me so easily. I don’t want to have to write stories about random events, but I can’t help it. I’m going to give it a shot though. Heck, I’m so distracted that I even have put the trailer before the truck: I’ve spent too much time searching for an agent (or even figuring out if I need one) before I hold anything in my hands to show them. “Focus Jason,” is my new mantra of choice.
So focus, I will. It’s going to be hard but I will. Even though trucking always gets in the way, I’ll have to use a sizable amount of my free time to “get-er-done.” There are weekends and there are evenings (however rare) when trucking has not completely exhausted my mind, body, and soul. There is even the occasion where I have a two-day trip; I’m usually finished up early in the day and have enough time to bang a chapter or two out. There’s even the one-day trip that turns into a two-day trip out of pure circumstance. I had one of these (or so I thought) in the final week leading up to Thanksgiving.
There’s nothing like the “Thanksgiving rush.” Allow me to explain: the majority of furniture buyers are in fact, Women. Women like to wait to the last minute, which is why they are rarely on time for anything. As much as I love them, this creates hassles within my life right down to the way it affects my job. Usually right around mid-November, an entire gaggle of Women decide they need new dining room tables and sofas for their guests to enjoy. So they rush to their nearest furniture store and place their order with the stipulation that they “want it now.” Fortunately for them, when they pick our wonderful products at my company for their purchase, we can usually accommodate them. Everyone from the people in our warehouse, to our planning office personnel and everyone else in between, right down to our drivers, works like mad to make it happen. Sometimes, it makes my head hurt.
Monday of Thanksgiving week was unusually relaxing; I had six very easy stops sprinkled across lovely upstate New York and had just enough time to make it back home before my working hours expired for the day. My concern driving home was the day was so relaxing that it might have been like the calm before the storm. I was right.
Somewhere between Cobleskill, New York, and our home base in Leesport, Pa, I made the call to see what was next on my menu. One of my dispatchers told me, “We have you on thirteen stops, starting in Laurel, Maryland and ending in Laurel, Maryland for tomorrow. They are not all in Laurel, but do what you can and keep us updated.” I hung up the phone, picked up my rather solid Mag-Lite flashlight off the floor next to my drivers seat and slammed it against my skull, just to see if I was having a bad dream. It hurt. It wasn’t a dream. “Oh well,” I told myself, “as long as there aren’t any stops in D.C. it might just be doable.”
When I arrived back at our wonderful gated community in Leesport, I was horrified to see there was not one, but two stops in D.C. The rest were sprinkled around the Capitol Beltway where traffic can be a never-ending nightmare on a good day. As much as I love the people in my planning office, I couldn’t help but let out a sigh as I wondered if they are subject to the same random drug testing that I am. I also thought of the two choices that lay before me.
My first choice involves a little trick that I always keep in my back pocket for trips as unappetizing as this and it’s a pure “for emergency use only” type of tactic that I seriously considered putting to use. It’s a rather simple plan that involves going to the nearest Chinese restaurant, diving into the dumpster behind it and then eating all the discarded, days old scraps of food I can find. After that, I just have to wait for morning and the resulting pain (and eruptions from various parts of the body) before I call in to work and say “Argh- I think I ate some bad Chinese yesterday and I can’t possibly make it into work!”
My second option - which is also the one I ended up going with – was to go on the trip even though I knew it would probably turn into a two-day trip. Running around the beltway in an eighteen wheeler with thirteen stops on the menu can be as painful as eating bad Chinese, but on the bright side, I’d probably have some time to catch up on writing in between days one and two. Besides, thirteen stops pays pretty darn good -making it a pure “What doesn’t kill you makes you richer” scenario.
I should mention, even though I like to write and someday hope to make it my “bill paying” profession, I’m keenly aware that being a truck driver is what pays the bills now and as such, planned on doing what I could to finish this trip in one day. Heck, a lot of unprepared women were waiting on the items stuffed within my trailer. I’m also a smart enough man to know it’s never good to disappoint a woman, including our customers and the ones that reside within our planning office, so off I went!
Pre-trip inspection done and prayers said, I departed Leesport at six thirty Tuesday morning, an hour later than I should have, nonetheless as legally as I could have.. One hour behind schedule right off the bat. Interstate 83 and 695 around Baltimore was unexpectedly smooth sailing. Then I got to 95, which was at a standstill because a couple cars got tangled up and ended up smashed on both shoulders. The road was open but people have to take a look at the aftermath of such an incident for reasons I’ll never understand. Another half hour goes up in smoke at right about the same time my first customer calls me wondering where I am.
Don’t get me wrong, I love our customers because they keep us in business and put food on the table, but it can be a huge distraction when they call wondering where I am. Sometimes I have no idea how they got my number or how they even knew that I was the lucky duck bringing them presents. There I am, driving along thinking of things that often have nothing to do with the road (or day) ahead of me and “ring, ring, ring”. I’m brought back to reality because of annoying technology that is the cell phone. If that’s not bad enough, sometimes the customers strike a tone that suggests I spent my morning on the porch of my palatial mansion, soaking in the hot-tub while smoking a cigar before finally arising from the water and wrapping my body in a ten-million thread count cotton robe with a yawn and saying, “ahh, guess I’ll meander over to work now.” Little do they know the truth is often that I left my palatial mansion (that lacks a hot-tub) at a painfully dark hour, and I often struggle more than Santa Claus while trying to get to them as quickly as my little eighteen wheels will carry me.
Enough with my customer distractions, let’s get back to my day from heck:
A few customers move in a manner that suggests they think I am there only for them and have nowhere else to go today. One customer, who also doubles as a store manager, informs me, “I’m going to change clothes real quick, I’ll be right back” before disappearing for ten minutes. The back of my head begins to feel like someone is sticking ten thousand little needles in it. Somewhere around three thirty in the afternoon I realize I haven’t had any food since a Hot Pocket at six in the morning. Things were not looking favorable for me to finish this up before customers started closing for the day. I wondered why I just didn’t go with my “Bad Chinese” plan.
Surprisingly, my two stops in the “always traumatic” District of Columbia went off without a hitch sans the ten million traffic lights making it the usual slow go. By five thirty in the evening I was en route to my second to last stop with my head hurting so bad that it felt like the ten-thousand needles had been upgraded to small nails. The pain, even when trying not to move my head was terrible, was just strong enough to make me forget I never had the time to eat any food. My Advil bottle was empty but I was not completely out of luck, if I somehow managed to get this second-to-last stop off in a timely fashion, I could still make my last stop back in Laurel because they were open to 7, but willing to wait until 8, if I could make it by then.
The second to last stop is a real pickle during normal hours, and I was real concerned how this less than truck-friendly shopping center might look this late in the evening. As I pulled in, it was way worse than even I anticipated. Every turn, from off of the main road to every turn thereafter, requires a lot of prayer and even more luck. The prayer comes in handy in hoping that I swung wide enough to make the corners and the luck comes in that no cars enter the intersections where I will be turning. Prayer wasn’t helping and luck was absent on this journey. The shopping center was jam packed beyond belief and it took ten minutes just navigating through the parking lot before I was able to set myself up to back behind the shopping center to the customer’s delivery area. It’s a pain in the ass on a normal day; backing in behind the building is done by swinging the trailer to my right on the side I can’t see, also known as the dreaded blind-side backing. I have to get out a few thousand times to get it just right but tonight there’s an added element of surprise. The space along side the shopping center is tight enough, but at this late hour there is an entire row of parked cars taking up the space I require to get back there. But I try.
It quickly becomes evident that the last two cars (at the minimum) must be moved to make this work, and God knows where the owners are or when they’ll return. I have reached my limit. I’m ready to throw in the towel; I call the customer (who I quite like by the way) to explain what’s happening. I tell them there are cars everywhere. They say maybe they can get them moved. I say it’s impossible, there are too many. They tell me they are coming; they’ll see what they can do. I think, “I’ve had enough. I’m going to get a hotel, some Advil, some food, (in that order) and come back in the morning.”
As I wait, a lady appears from around the corner and starts walking in my direction, where I sit frustrated beyond all belief, in my truck, right next to the first two cars that need moved. She walks over to me and asks me, in broken English, what I am doing. I half want to answer her, “I’ve been wondering that myself.” She is pretty in the face with alluring eyes, but after I explain multiple times what I am trying to do (including how these cars need moved) she keeps asking the same question, in a manner that suggests I think it’s fun to randomly park a tractor-trailer this late in the evening, alongside a building, because I have nothing better to do. I may as well have been wearing an Elvis-like T-shirt that said, “Jason has left the body” because I uncharacteristically raised my voice and one more time tried to explain “Lady, I need these cars moved so I can back this truck behind this building!” She looked at me with a quizzical look upon her face, then gave up and walked away, to the very first car that was in my way. To my utter amazement, she hopped in and drove it away.
I was within seconds from shifting from reverse to third gear and driving myself to the safety of a hotel, the relief of Advil, and the comforts of some nourishment, when the customer appeared. With his help watching my back, and with the lady of ten thousand repetitive questions freeing up just enough space, I was able to finally back my truck up and finish the delivery. With my head hurting like it’s never hurt in my life, I made a mad (but safe) dash for my final stop of the trip. This customer gave me great directions but I was still relieved to see him outside along the road, waving his arms in the air wildly, clearing marking where I was to turn into his driveway. Ten minutes later, at seven fifteen in the evening, a miracle had been performed. The trip from Hell had been completed in one day. It was nine hours from first stop to last stop, and it wasn’t any fun, but I did my job. I didn’t have enough time to make it back to Leesport, but I didn’t care. There was a truck stop 10 minutes away where I could get a shower, some Advil, and of course, food. First I called in empty and learned I was already dispatched on five stops for the next day from Oxford Pa to Malvern Pa. Seemed like an easy load but I didn’t even care to think about it- I just wanted to be parked, showered, fed, and then off to sleep.
I pulled into the truck stop and was halfway amused to see a single open parking space, right near the main entrance to the building. “Wow,” I thought, “the universe might actually like me again!” Within seconds, the truck was parked and my microwave was micro-waving a Stauffer’s Turkey and filling dinner, which I promptly enjoyed. That meal was followed by a supreme pizza Hot Pocket, followed later by two bowls of cereal. I went inside and purchased some Extra Strength Tylenol (only $6.80 for 24, what a deal!), got a shower and finally, went to my truck where I could do what I wanted to do for so many hours: lie down on a flat surface. My mind, body, and soul were in no shape to write, so I did the next best thing: I read.
What I picked to read was interesting as well as oddly comforting. A couple of Sundays ago, I bought a Wall Street Journal, the most of which has long been discarded. I kept the Magazine inside of it, named appropriately enough: The Wall Street Journal Magazine. I held onto to it because there were several items inside of it I thought I should read, amazing things like how to buy a helicopter, how to buy vintage cars, rare wines and even estate jewelry. I never felt the need to buy any of these things, but if you told me ten years ago that I would be a truck driver, I never would have believed you. Along those same lines, even though I don’t anticipate buying those things, I can’t be sure that I never will be in the market for them and hence my reasoning for holding onto the magazine.
Oddly, as I lay down in my comfortable upstairs truck bed, I didn’t go to those articles. I became fixated on one I did not see until that night. It was an article about a married couple, both of which are authors. His name is Martin Amis, and apparently he is a famous British Novelist, whom I have never had heard of. That’s the thing about great writers, as good as they may be, half the population (perhaps more) has never heard of them. Tragic really. Martin’s Wife Isabel is equally fascinating. I was grateful for a look into a couple of real life writer’s lives and a getting a glimpse of how they think and interact with other, as well as with the world.
Martin’s Father was also a novelist and he recalls his Father in the study, hard at work and used the terminology “more or less hermetically sealed off in there.” Interesting - sounds like me, when I’m at home and in our upstairs bedroom cut off from the rest of the family. He speaks of his desire for the quiet life and how conflict “breaks his concentration.” Really? He should try delivering five loads (on average) of furniture in a tractor-trailer every week! He says he’s not terribly social; either am I! I don’t even like people! I don’t like them in a bad way, only when they blow their horns at me, clog up the roads in front of me, or jump off of buses, in hordes, and create people-jams in the restrooms at service plazas as I’m trying to take care of an intestinal emergency.
In a sense, writers are solitary people and that’s what I like best about my job as a truck driver: I can be alone with my thoughts; but the people, other than our more fun-to-see customers, can be a distraction. This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes by another writer, Charles Bukowski. When asked if he hates people he replied, “I don’t hate them, I just feel better when they’re not around.” My sentiments exactly; I’d have the best job in the world if I was the only vehicle on the road, the only person in line at a food counter, or I if had an Easy Button to hit when arriving at a difficult delivery, be it with difficult people or difficult truck parking logistics.
I found Martin’s Wife Isabel equally fascinating. She is beautiful and perhaps out of Martin’s league had he been an ordinary citizen and not a famous novelist, not unlike my situation with my Wife. I’m not famous (nor do I desire to be) but sometimes I think my Wife only hangs on in the off chance I do become a successful writer. I say “writer” and not “novelist” because I’ve never figured out how to make up a story, let alone successfully tell it.
A quote Isabel spoke during the story struck a chord with me: “Sometimes I worry I’ve only published two books- two and a half if you count the one about my brother- and I’m 49. I get worried about time. Will there be time?”
I worry about time all the time myself. She at least has two published books under her belt and I if knew her personally I might suggest she stop her whining and count her blessings. But I know where she is coming from - since we live in a world where the next day is never guaranteed, my hope is nothing happens to me that would prevent me from at least finishing my noble attempt at that first book. Her worries about time somehow made me reflect on the evolution of my own mind over time. When I was in my youth, I used to think, “If I could just share a bed with two women, at the same time, then I could die a happy man, at any time.” These days I am more likely to think, “If I could just complete this book, then I could die a happy man, whenever that day shall come, but I hope it’s not too soon because I could probably write a second book.”
I don’t really believe that because I saw similarities between this wonderful couple and myself that it automatically makes me a successful writer-to-be. For all I know, the traits that I believe might make me a good writer might also qualify me as a certified psychopath. There’s only one-way to find out, and that is to refer back to my mantra: “Focus Jason. Focus.”
But I do consider myself more goal-oriented than the average truck driver. Multiple Scientific studies have shown that when truck drivers are asked where they plan to be in ten years, 3 out of 5 replied “dunno, holding this steering wheel?” I like my steering wheel quite a lot, thank-you very much, but it’s never been my plan to at least not try making more of my life.
In the name of finishing this writing, allow me to re-focus and finish it up.
The next morning after reading that article about the famous novelists (who surely must aspire to be me) I awoke refreshed and boogied back to Pennsylvania where I hoped set record time doing the old switch-a-roo with trailers and hit the pike again. I skipped food since the following day was Thanksgiving, and I also dodged one phone call and one person, each trying to give me a turkey. I wanted to get going so I could get home as early as possible on Thanksgiving eve, so off I went.
I wasn’t on the road ten minutes when the phone rang; I looked at the number and thought it originated from our yard – the one I just left - so I ignored it, thinking it may be yet another person trying to pawn off a dead frozen bird. Ten minutes later, while lazily cruising south on Interstate 176 towards the PA Turnpike, I checked the voicemail left from the call in question.
It was our money lady back in Leesport. She gets my trip packets when there is money involved, and the trip from hell contained quite a few checks. She didn’t have any dead birds to offer, only words of admonishment regarding my trip from hell on the prior day:
“Jason, I sure hope you’re not training. I hope the new guy knows that every bill-of-lading needs to be signed, and you had quite a few that were not, from yesterday’s load. I just wanted to get on your case about that.”
I hung up the phone and wondered if she is in fact, insane. Does she know who she’s dealing with? Does she know that I am a writer-in-my-own-mind and could spin an entire story out of her voicemail? If the Cop up in Framingham was to be considered a victim of mine, she’s next in line!
The truth of the matter is that the trailer sits post-tripped and empty back in Leesport. The only memory I have of the day was the pain in my head as I tried my best to get every customer their stuff, on the day promised, and I was successful (just barely) in my attempt. Sure, I know every page of every bill-of-lading needs to be signed and I always pay attention to that. Somehow, during the most uncomfortable day I have ever experienced in my five years with the company, I slipped up and missed one (or two.) Notice she didn’t say anything about missing COD checks; I paid proper attention to the really important stuff!
By the way, I happened to run into her the other morning while strolling through our offices and she asked me if I got her “nasty-o-gram,” her words, not mine.
“Yes I did. And I don’t train any more.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m too old. I retired from it.”
She brought up the unsigned paperwork again before adding, “Perhaps you should retire entirely if you can’t do the job right.”
“I’m working on it.”
She may have thought those words “I’m working on it,” were just words falling out of my mouth, but I assure you, they were said with conviction. As much as I love my job, its little moments like these that I’ll never miss if I am ever successful in my journey to be a writer. And I sure won’t miss getting up at a painfully dark hour. Or not eating all day. Or the rare times when I get the “ten-thousand-little-needles-in-my-head” feeling. Writing to me is a much more comfortable job than bouncing down the highway in an eighteen-wheeler.
Where was I? That money lady in Leesport got me distracted! Darn Her!
Oh yes, I was en route on my Thursday evening six drop load and I had just listened to her voicemail. I hung up the phone, shook my head and started thinking happy thoughts again. Ten minutes later the phone rang again, a call from our headquarters in Wisconsin, so I answered it immediately.
It was one of my dispatchers: “Your first stop is wondering where you are….they’d like an ETA………”
What?
What was I saying?
Oh, I give up. Trucking is just too distracting.
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