The Job

Prompt: Find a job ad in the paper. Write about your life if you had that job.

I started preparing for this piece the day before Thanksgiving.  I stopped off at a Kroger and picked up a copy of the Dayton Daily News.  This was literally the only job ad in the classifieds. Because I know nothing about the life of a truck driver I hit up Quora to get picture of life on the road.  Big thanks to J.W. Bruce Shaw, Rick Klugman, & Owen Lewis, real-life veteran truck drivers who generously took the time to share with me what their jobs are like.

My day starts early. On a typical day, I'm up at 4:30. I put on my work clothes, jeans, a t-shirt, a hoodie, and sturdy work boots. I sit in the living room with a single lamp on for some quiet devotional time, nursing my first coffee of the day. I try be out the door by five or shortly after to get to my first pick up ahead of rush hour traffic.  I park the rig in one of the large parking spaces on the boulevard that passes in front of our apartment.  We're hoping to buy a house this year and a big driveway is a deal breaker. 

I climb up into the drivers seat, start up the engine, check in with dispatch, and queue up my morning music . I'm not one to drive in silence. I always have something--a playlist of over a thousand songs curated for driving, various podcasts I'm faithful to, as well as NPR for the news.  I was never a books on tape guy but I've got the Audible app now, and I'm coming around. I'll even listen to a good sermon series that my best friend J recommends.

I'll usually get to my first pick-up around 6.  I just leave the empty trailer I was hauling and hook up to a new one ready to go.  After that it's pretty much driving from one point to another all day long mostly around Ohio but occasionally into West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Michigan or Indiana. and end late.  Being on the road isn't terrible.  It can get pretty boring, especially since large portions of Ohio are flat, unremarkable farmland.  Still there's not much downtime. I'm paid by the mile and many of my deliveries are time sensitive. My eye is always on the clock. I tend to eat on the run.  I used to get a lot of fast food, but I rapidly grew sick of that kind of diet.  Babs is such a saint--she prepares the most wonderful healthy lunches, which she packs in a blue and white portable cooler.

Despite the pressure of on time deliveries, I am a conservative driver.  I stay in the right lane.  I don't feel a need to pass.  Unless there's a major traffic situation I prefer not to speed. It doesn't help me get there much faster.  The speed limit is faster than getting pulled over, or worse wrecking the rig. That's always been a great fear, especially early on,  losing an entire flatbed of pipe and causing a huge accident. Bad driving by non-truck drivers is regular annoyances. Cars cutting in front of me and then hitting the brakes, cars hovering in my blind spot, or cars riding on my tail, trying to "draft" off of me.  Before I became a trucker I did a lot of those things, not out spite but just because I didn't know better.


The hardest part about my job is the long days.  It's true that unlike my wife's job, when I'm done, I'm done. I never take work home with me.  The problem is when I get home. I wouldn't mind the early mornings if I was getting home in the early afternoon, or even the late afternoon.  The ad said I'd be home every night.  What they failed to mention is that every night doesn't mean coming home early enough to tuck your kids in. It's not unusual for me to come in from a day on the road well after midnight. It can be days where I don't see the boys at all.  Barbara pretty much raises them alone during the week, all while having to deal with her responsibilities as a teacher. I think my lack of involvement and my inability to provide her much help is a source of strain on our relationship.  I  also really miss having the chance to run (or really exercise at all).  Because I can't work on the Sabbath and thus always have Friday and Saturday off, I am always scheduled the remaining five days of the week.  Running once, maybe twice a week just isn't enough.

On the weekends, I try to catch up on sleep, try to make it to church spend time with the boys, spend time with Babs.  I should probably do more to help around the house, but I'm just always so exhausted.

Between my driving and Barbara's teacher's salary we're doing pretty good, but I wonder if it's really worth it.


Don't like having to secure loads myself. Prefer pre-loaded, where I just hook up and drive.