Hanging it up for real

[Morning Star]

Now I just have to figure out the ugly problem of making ends meet on less than half the pay I used to earn. Ugh.

Good luck with that. My husband and I had to figure out how to do that when I had to quit driving (due to a baby being on the way). It was stressful for us. I hope that you have an easier adjustment.

[silvan]

I thought I'd wander by and post another followup for those of you who have been following my plight on this thread.

I had to go back and check the dates. Apparently I'm halfway through my fifth week of living in the real world, and punching a time clock.

It's easy to lose track.

I don't think I'm heading back out there, and I might never drive an 18-wheeler again.

What's more, I'm not even looking to trade up for a better real world job than changing oil and tires at Wal-Mart. Not yet. For the first time in years, I'm not looking for anything, and I'm not going around gnawing on the "I should take the good with the bad and plow on with driving" bone. I'm just enjoying the moment and making the most of what has been a really alien state of mind for me for most of my adult life. I'm enjoying contentment, and freedom from worry.

The most telling event during this whole experience was one night when my wife reminded me to take my Pepcid before bed, so I could sleep. I realized I don't have to take those anymore. No more acid reflux problems.

Some of that was the big worry at the end about what was going to happen to my dedicated freight, but not all of it. I had been taking those antacids at bedtime for years before anything on the driving front started to fall apart on me.

No, I think I'm done with driving. I know guys who can't imagine doing anything else, and more power to those who love it. I was never really in it for much more than a paycheck. It grew on me, and I became damn good at it, but there's not much love lost here. I wasn't born to it. I just forced myself to learn how to do it, and to become good at it, very good at it, in spite of having no natural aptitude for the profession at all.

Breaking up is hard to do, and this was hard, but I really needed to break up with trucking. I'm a different person now. So much more relaxed, and not worried about anything, even though we're so broke now I should be terrified.

It was the right choice. The only thing keeping me trapped was the money, and by giving up the money, and all that material :dung: along the way, I'm free.

FREE!

More free than I've been in years, even though it would seem like the opposite should be true, considering how much more rigidly structured my life is now compared with driving.

I'm proud of that chapter of my life, and I will tell stories about it until I die, but I don't think I will be coming up with any new stories anytime soon, and probably never again.

But I'll never say never. Who knows. I'll keep my CDL, even though I guess after six months or a year or something, nobody will hire you.

[golfhobo]

Okay, we get it, Sylvan..... you were really, really, REALLY good at it!!



Just KIDDING, dude!! :wink:

Thanks for the update. I've been wondering how it was working out for you. I know what you mean about the Pepcid thing..... only for me it was the opposite.

I used to be really depressed. When I started trucking.... all that went away! I felt TRAPPED here in the South, and getting back out West set me FREE!! You felt trapped by your trucking job, and now you are Free!

It's a good feeling. I wish you the best.... and do stick around and keep in touch!

Hobo

[silvan]

Okay, we get it, Sylvan..... you were really, really, REALLY good at it!!

Yeah man, I was.

Thanks for the update. I've been wondering how it was working out for you. I know what you mean about the Pepcid thing..... only for me it was the opposite.

It's all about finding whatever makes you happy.

The funny thing is I was just talking to Mom's old best friend, and one of the last sane things Mom said was that she expected me to go back to Wal-Mart and stay there.

Yup. Mom was right. Or at least partially right. I might get into working on these bitches. I like working in a shop. It's almost as much freedom as the road in a lot of ways (and as much responsibility) and it has turned out to be a surprisingly good fit for me.

When I decided to go back to Wal-Mart, I figured I'd go back to where I came from when I started all this, and try to get into a position as a department manager, and then try to get into salaried management.

When they said the only full-time openings they had were in the shop, they unwittingly closed the door on someone who could have turned out to be a great manager.

Because of the way the pay structure works, and the premium I get for having dirty fingernails, if I leave the shop to take the department they're offering me now, I have to supervise 10 people and deal with several tiers of salaried management for an additional $2 a week.

Pfffffft!

I think I'll just change my tires and oil, thanks. For now, I'm just enjoying not being miserable all the time. Trucking had its ups for sure, but they were few and far between.

[cdreid]

And you know.. noone is going to remember that you delivered that "emergency " load of cabbages to kalamazoo in the dead of winter on icy roads so tired you cant sleep.

They'll remember that book long long after your'e gone.

As a writer once said when asked for advice on how to become a professional writer "Writers Write".

I dont see the word truck anywhere in that sentence.

[belpre122]

[silvan]

And you know.. noone is going to remember that you delivered that "emergency " load of cabbages to kalamazoo in the dead of winter on icy roads so tired you cant sleep.

That's true, and that advice scales out to a lot of other things in life. I had a friend who was stressing over something, and I recounted the story of how I drove home from Virginia Beach in ever-increasing snow cover. By the end of it, I was running in a foot of snow in an empty (for all intents and purposes) single-axle cabover, and I damn near lost it going up a mountain.

The moral of the story is I should have stopped in Bedford with all the other trucks. I had a lot of time to ponder that gleaming Wal-Mart parking lot and wonder WTF I was doing plodding on.

In that case, I was coming home in order to do something I considered really important, but whatever it was, it wasn't that important.

I should have stopped in Bedford.

I'm glad I finally did. I don't know if I could even still drive one of those things now, and I feel 10 years younger too.

More power to those for whom life offers no other acceptable choice. I know plenty of them, and we're still friends, but I'm glad I hung it up. Just because I can be a supertrucker when I need to be, my heart just isn't in it.

All the bull**** out there, and so little compensation when you look at what you really have to do to earn a living. It's the best kept dirty secret in America. This whole damn country runs on slave sweat.