Dawn III: June 19, 1988 - Livonia, Michigan

It's really November 19, 2009, it really is Livonia, Michigan, and it really is dawn. It's raining slightly and it's in the high 40s with a little bit of a raw wind blowing. Not very exciting, but also not very uncommon for this area and this time of year. I just got done backing into a dock at a nondescript warehouse near the Jeffries and Levan. So, while we are waiting to be unloaded, as a bit of a short mental vacation, I'm letting my mind wander back roughly 21 and a half years, when the weather was nicer and the reason for enjoying daybreak was much more significant....

5:54am - 6.19.88 - Idyl Wyld Golf Course - Livonia, Michigan

Because it's close to the Summer solstice, the sun is actually trying hard to peak above the trees. There are three cars in the parking lot, and three would be golfers in various stages of final preparation for a round of golf - trunks open, half full coffee cups sitting on the car roofs and the familiar sound of a bag of clubs being hoisted out of the trunk and stood upright on the blacktop.


When the spikes are finally all tied, the three head down the slight incline and along the fence behind the ninth green, turn left and walk the remaining 25 yards to the first tee. Each has his own little ritual involving swinging a club or two and stretching a hamstring or a lower back and listening for the familiar creaks and pop of the joints. They are thirtysomethings but 6am is still pretty early for the mind to be fully in control of the body. As they go through their motions, a fourth car pulls up in the parking lot.


By now there is enough light to begin to see most things clearly. The first hole is not a long par four. It's straight and the fairway is not wide but certainly fair. Mature trees line the entire left side and a scattering of various sized pine trees sit to the right between the short grass and the out-of-bounds fence. Beyond the fence lies Five Mile Road and the rest of the world. In front of the tee is a small river, or wide creek, that really should never come into play (but once or twice a year it does anyway). 


By the time the fourth golfer reaches the tee, sputtering excuses for being late, the other three have launched their first shot of the day - one right, one left and one that may or may not have hung onto the fairway on the right hand side. Without wasting any time, and continuing with the excuses, the fourth golfer tees up his ball and sends a high left-to-right fade that finds the fairway. All four pick up their bags, walk on across the bridge, and leave the real world behind. Twenty five years earlier they carried their bags because they couldn't afford not to; now they carry their bags because it is good for them.


The fairway is still damp and the dew and grass clippings stick to the golfers' shoes. They each ultimately find their respective golf ball, and anywhere from two to four shots later they are all on the green wondering how much the dew will affect the speed and line of the putts. In turn they all two-putt, which is a bit unusual, but hey, it does happen every now and then. There are now four sets of footprints in the dew on the green, and you can see in lines left behind by each roll the exact two-part route each ball took in getting to the hole.


It's now almost 6:15 and the sun has officially made its appearance. Already the day feels a few degrees warmer, and the sun is beginning to burn off the morning moisture. In a few hours it will be 85 degrees and sunny, but for now the attention turns to the second tee, and not much else really matters.

Talkin' Truck - Part I

"Preciate it driver."

Notice the word appreciate doesn't have an "ap" on the front of it. And, now a days everybody is "driver" and not "good buddy." "Good Buddy" was appropriated by the gay community of CBers and has a completely different meaning. Sort of like the word "gay" itself. It used to be perfectly good word to use to describe someone. Now it's still a perfectly good word that can be used to describe someone, but the meaning is completely different.

So, now you get stuff like "preciate it driver, but I knowed that all along." So, you see, in the vernacular of the modern trucker, you can turn any word you want into the past tense just by putting an "ed" on the end...knowed, throwed, etc. And, if someone understands everything about the situation "he just knowed all  that all along."

Actually, the CB chatter isn't what it used to be because of the cell phone. Once in a while you get a legitimate conversation happening, but not very often. And, nobody uses "handles" any more. It's just plain "driver." Depending upon where you are in this country, the CB chatter that does occasionally happen can get pretty racist, sexist, and just plain perverted. I suppose that's entertaining to some people, but mostly it comes off as pretty sad, and most truckers just turn the radio off when that crap starts.


We keep the CB on pretty much as a safety device. It can be helpful in traffic jams, or if someone is stopped by the side of a road and not easy to see. Or, once in a while it comes in handy for getting final directions. But, for the most part, the radio is silent.

Truckers have developed a language all there own. A few Examples:

• Stick or Yardstick - the mile markers on the interstate, so they can tell each other where the bears are sitting or rolling
• Bears - cops, usually state highway patrol officers. They can either be two-wheels bears - motorcycle cops - or they can be full grown and drive some sort of patrol car  - or, they can just sit at the beginning of a construction zone or accident scene with their light flashing and become a "care bear"
  
• Gator - the remnants of a truck tire that has gone flat and also gone unnoticed by the driver. After a while, the flat will heat up and completely disintegrate, and leave large and small chunks - gators - all over the place
• Lot Lizard - truck stop hookers, usually they are strung out on something and and pretty sad - often look like two days of bad weather
  
• Skateboard - a flatbed truck
• Parking Lot - automobile hauler
• Bobtail - a tractor with no trailer
• Deadhead - having an empty trailer
  

So, this makes for some interesting comments on the CB: "Watch out for the big gator in the hammer lane at the 151 stick southbound" or "Rolling full grown eastbound at the split." 

And, as you can see from the photo at the beginning of this rambling, we see some interesting signs. Not all of them make sense, and some, like the one above, can have more than one meaning - but that's probably the topic for another conversation. This particular sign was in a truck loading area at an RC Cola bottling plant in Louisville, KY. We got stuck there for most of an afternoon earlier this year, and I didn't see anyone obey the sign all day.

Ft. Pierce, Florida - March 2009

Sunday morning, and I'm sitting in the back lot of one of the two (side-by-side, go figure) Pilot truck stops in sunny Ft. Pierce, FL. Much nicer than Kearney, NJ. This is a fairly small truck stop, as truck stops go, and it's pretty clean and well-lighted -- which means is smells better than most truck stops. The larger truck stops tend to smell pretty funky, especially in warmer weather, because truckers are too lazy to walk the 100 or so yards to the bathroom at 3AM. So, little puddles of stank magically form under many of the trucks overnight. But, this place is all concrete, and has enough lights to make taking a mid-night leak in the parking lot a little too obvious.

Beth's folks spend three months each winter at Port St. Lucie, which is only about 11 miles from here, so she got to spend last night at her folks - catching up with them and doing laundry. They'll come and get me in a little while and I'll get to spend some of the afternoon with them, have a beer or two and maybe watch some golf or March Madness with my father-in-law. I had to stay with the truck last night because we have a load on board, and the truck has to be attended overnight. We're carrying almost 45,000 pounds of corn seed destined for Iowa City, Iowa. The seed came into the country through Miami on a cargo ship from Europe. So, all this begs the question: Why is Iowa buying corn seed from anywhere other than Iowa? Isn't that a little like selling ice to Eskimos?

We're in the process of what is called a 34-hour restart - where we have to take 34 consecutive hours off (we can stagger that so we only really have to sit idle for about 22-23 hours) and all of our available driving/on duty hours reset to zero. It happens when you're very busy, so that's a good sign. We've really been hustling this past ten days or so ... Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Kansas City, Kenosha, Chicago, Baltimore, Norfolk, Syracuse, Memphis, Miami - and currently in Ft. Pierce. We'll leave here around here 8-9PM tonight, and be in Iowa City in plenty of time for a 7AM delivery on Tuesday morning.

Kearny, NJ - March 8, 2009

Greetings from beautiful Kearny, NJ. We got stuck here for the day - with a delivery to make in Quincy, MA in the morning. But, because of this particular load, we had to wait here. It's what is referred to as a High Value load, which means the truck has to be parked in a secure location when we're not moving. The view in this drop yard is stunning ... rusted cargo containers, weather-worn green vinyl snow fences, and brackish mud puddles that range in depth from a couple of inches to deep enough to lose a shoe in. The sun is shining at the moment but it still seems dreary.

Things are a bit slow with freight, but I suppose that's the way of the world at the moment. We've been moderately busy, enough to stay ahead of the game, but we would like to be busier. That will come as things start to loosen - hopefully sooner than later. 

The day actually got a little better as it went on, in large part to a fellow trucker named Craig - who is actually from the Uhrichsville area in Ohio - and drives for Arnold, which is a division of US Xpress. He was stuck in the same situation as we were, on hold for a day or so, and he was pretty bored.

He saw Beth sitting in the driver's seat (I was sleeping at the time) and he drove his truck right up beside ours and started talking. Beth is kind of like that; people have this tendency to just start talking to her, telling her their life's story, as though they had known her for a long time. Anyway, after talking for an hour or so, he took off and came back about a half an hour later with a bunch of food he had just picked up at the local grocery story - some meatloaf, a small pork roast, mashed potatoes, a gallon of iced tea and a couple of different kinds of veggies. At his insistence, we took the two tractors to a remote part of the drop yard and had a picnic. It seems, according to Craig, this kind of thing used to happen from time to time when drivers would get stuck together in a yard or at a terminal. Now a lot places frown on picnics and most companies outlaw them completely. My guess is the insurance industry had a hand in banning the practice. It did help pass the time for us even if we had to listen to a couple of hours of country/trucking music blaring from Craig's tractor.


We still like this game a lot. It seems to fit us well, and we get to see a lot of amazing country. Today is really the exception - there is a lot of beautiful scenery in New Jersey, just not here in Kearny. We like Tennessee and Connecticut for pure beauty, but it seems that every state has something of it's own personality - Wyoming and Southern Idaho are stunning, but in an odd way. The upper Midwest is lush and green in the spring, which is stunning, and Texas is, well Texas and California both really, have a little bit of everything

Motion

The lifestyle of a trucker is about a strange addiction to motion. They will all tell you it's about the money, and to some extent that is true, but it's mostly about the need to not sit still. This really is not so much a job as it is a lifestyle. And, I have to admit, it gets in your blood a bit if you let it. I don't sit still as well as I used to.


We started this past week on Sunday afternoon sitting across the roadway from Mount Shasta. Yes, really, just about right across the street, in a rest area, from Mount Shasta. Then, down to Modesto and LA. From there we took a  load to Laredo and then back North to Chicago. Next was Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and here I sit on a Sunday morning, a week later, in Memphis. Oddly enough, the only bad time of the week was the day we sat around in Laredo waiting to have the front end aligned and take care of a couple of "recall' items on the truck. We sat and sat, and there were no roses to smell at the Freightliner dealership.


But, as I said, the motion is the addictive part. During the day, the motion speaks for itself. There really is an amazing sight outside of our windows most of the time, even if we've seen it before several times. During the day you get this sense of rushing along through the country (or city) side at 65 miles an hour. You can see the effects of the wind, and feel whether the sun is in front of you or behind you. Everything along the way is punctuated by buildings or trees or mountains or rivers, and you can tell when you've gone a mile or ten miles just by the difference in the view. 


At night it is a different story. Night is more like playing a fairly intense little video game. After a 3-4-5 or 6 hour run, it begins to feel as though you are no longer moving (maybe just jiggling about some), and everything is rushing at and by you. There is no distance, unless you are in or near a city, and there is no real change of scenery. Every little town begins to look like the last one, or the next one, and is made up of Golden Arches, signs with arrows telling you which way things go or turn, signs for Applebee's or Perkins, a hospital or High School, or a waffle house of some sort if you are in the South. Little strip malls are little strip malls, and rest areas are all filled with the same trucks as the last rest area. It's a much tougher time of day to drive long distance.

The one true upside to night driving is the stars. We get to stop in some pretty dark places, and the stars can get intense. 

So, this is about enough sitting around for the moment. Time to head back over to Fedex and pick up a load for Huntington, WV. Who knows for sure where to from there; I guess it really doesn't matter as long as it's somewhere else. A week from today I'll wake up in my own bed in New Philadelphia, Ohio, and it will really feel strange not to be moving.

The Snake

This country has some great rivers. Not all of them are big and long and mighty, such as the Mississippi, but they all have a character all their own. And, together, they seem to tie the entire continent together, binding everything with one great flowing stream of liquid highway.

My favorite is the Snake River, particularly as it flows across Southern Idaho. The terrain is rugged; a cross between high desert plains, jagged mountain ranges and mesas whose tops have been worn smooth over the centuries by the high winds that are legendary in this area. Where else can you see signs that say "Frequent Dust Storms Possible - Do Not Stop On Roadway."

The Snake, which has its beginning high in the mountains of northwestern Wyoming in the Yellowstone National Park, is well over 1,000 miles long and literally snakes its way across some of the harshest landscapes America has to offer. After leaving Wyoming on a westerly course through Idaho Falls, it begins a sweeping southerly arc by Pocatello and on over through Twin Falls before turning north to pass west of Boise and on into Hell's Canyon on the Oregon/Idaho state line. Then, its north and west until somewhere near Kennewick, Washington, it becomes part of the Columbia River/Basin system. By the way, Hell's canyon, the nation's deepest canyon at just over 8,000 feet, was carved by the Snake, and is completely inaccessible by road - the only way in or out is by water (tough going) or by chopper (not a great idea either).
     
Last Spring I had the opportunity to drive I-86 West from Pocatello to Twin Falls. The water levels were very high, but across that stretch the river moves at a rather pedestrian pace. It is wide and powerful looking, and mountains and mesas come right up to the water's edge in many places along the northern side of the river. I-86 runs along the southern shore and offers some spectacular views of the river as is moves alternately closer to and further away from the highway. And it seems to go on forever.
     
At Twins Falls, you can drive across a bridge that spans "Magic Valley." We got to do this twice recently, and it is one of the most unnerving experiences I have ever been through. I'm not sure how deep the canyon is at that point, but it is deep enough to give you that queasy feeling in the pit of your stomach as you drive over it. There is one place in the valley where the land adjoining the river flattens out - and someone built a golf course there. Whoever built that course is now one of my heroes and I am going back to Twin Falls to play that course someday before I die.
     
We picked up a load of raw sugar in Twin Falls. Who would have thought Idaho was a sugar hot spot.
     
You learn a lot of strange things in this job.

The Eisenhower Interstate System

We see them all the time - American Flag-blue signs with a circle of five white stars and the words "Eisenhower Interstate System." Most states have at least some of them posted along the highways, and a number of states are fairly littered with them. It began in 1956 as part concession to the rapidly expanding American automobile industry, and part to fulfill some campaign promises to create a lot of new jobs. Today, the system is nearly 50,000 miles long and is still the largest Public Works project in history. As a kid growing up in Detroit in the 50s and 60s, and today as a truck driver, the system is a lifeline, a money-maker, a means to an end. It is an enormous part of the post-WWII American Dream, and lies at the very foundation of America's continuing love affair with the automobile.

Then, on the other hand, there is Allandale, South Carolina, Kokomo, Indiana, Newark, Ohio, or any one of a hundred little stops along Route 66, that owe their fate, in large part to the highway system built in the name of national defense and motion. Now these towns, because of the fact the Interstates go elsewhere, struggle with an identity, struggle to keep their industry and tax base intact, and wonder when the last old fashioned Dairy Queen will finally close. At one time Route 66 was the main east-west link between Chicago and Los Angeles, and fertile ground for creative entrepreneurs catering to the American motoring public. The first hot dog stands, the first Putt-Putt courses, and any number of bizarre one-of-a-kind tourist attractions all came to life along Route 66, and today they simply gather dust as they fade into obscurity. Holiday Inn started along the famed Route, and was one of the few organizations to realize the future was elsewhere.

My favorite sad small town story is Allendale, South Carolina. During the time between the American Civil War and the coming of the Interstate System, Allendale sat on an active commerce route (State 301) roughly in the middle of a rectangle made up of Columbia and Charleston, SC on the north and east, and Augusta and Savannah, GA on the west and south. Today is has roughly 20% of the population in had just 60-70 years ago.

We drove through Allendale in March as Spring was beginning to touch the South. The area is beautiful, with a number of small rivers flowing through it, and the remnants of old plantations and farms still scattered around the area. For a mile or two, the road tracked along side a classic old, and quite unused, railroad bed complete with decaying wood timber trestles and crossing signs. In the city itself we saw things such as an old Gulf Oil station with the orange and blue ball atop a post at the corner. It had become the Allandale dry Cleaning Service. We counted at least 12 motels which, we were guessing, were built shortly after WWII, that were no longer in use. I don't think Allendale has a hardware store anymore. The few motels that were being used were Days Inns, Knights Inns, or some other of the smaller, lesser known chains. Dead and decaying were the local mom and pop motels, the small, unique places which featured attached Bar and Grills, and all night restaurants - with, I might add, ample truck parking.

Don't get me wrong, I am certainly not against change and progress (which are often, but not always the same things). My life these days seems to change almost daily, if not hourly. But, I can't help it when I drive through these once-proud towns, towns with defunct businesses and homes, and little league diamonds that were one time somebody's dream, thinking about what they must have been like in 1961, or 1938 or 1955. At some time or another all of these places were really happenin places to be. Now they are simply places to turn around when you get lost.

Now, everything is ruled by chains, chains who have all staked out the prime ground around exits off the Interstate. Food, lodging, shopping - they are all now McDonald's, Holiday Inn Express or Wal-Mart, or something very much like them. The same holds true for truck stops - Pilots, Petros, Travel America, Flying J, Hess-Wilco, etc. Sometimes when we are lucky, we stumble across an independent truck stop in Malta, Idaho, or Rawlins, Wyoming, or Rochester, Indiana, that hasn't thrown in the towel - places that still have unpaved parking lots, diners with waitresses named Flo or Janice, and maybe a two-day old food stain on the menu. The fuel islands still have air for free, the drinking fountains still work, and hard-boiled eggs are three for a dollar. Those are the best stops we make.