I met a very cool woman a few days ago. I was sitting at a restaurant eating dinner with the family when a woman was seated at the table next to us. The details of how we came to interact are fuzzy, but her accent stuck out like a sore thumb in this part of New England. As did her cowboy hat and black leather boots.
She's a truckdriver, or "trucker" as she called it, because the term 'truckdriver' is too PC. "And truckers are anything but PC," she twanged. She hailed from Alabama and before we knew it, our dinners had taken a backseat to learning about her and her life on the road.
This leg of her trip, she was delivering meat to the 99 Restaurants in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, then was off to Connecticut to pick up some Peter Paul Candies (Almond Joy, Mounds, Cadbury, etc.) and head west. She drives on her own, never wanting a partner or other company. Her only source of communication is CB radio. We asked what her handle was. "Wildchild."
Wildchild has been driving trucks for 3 years. Her husband was killed in a car accident 10 years ago and her only child is married. She doesn't have anyone to depend on her and so this is her new life. And she loves it.
There have been so many times I have wanted to be Wildchild. Not to the point of leaving my husband and taking off for points unknown (it wouldn't be the same if he wasn't with me), but to get up and go. We would take turns driving and travel the country. See the sights. Meet people. Experience adventure. The hotel we end up staying at the end of the day depends on where we are on our trip. No itinerary, no known destination.
She said that she loves her job and I do believe her. I believe that the truckers she meets along the way are like her family now. But I couldn't imagine a family not waiting for me when I got back. Not having someone in the passenger's seat along for the ride with me. I envy Wildchild because she is doing what I would love to do. But the difference is that to her it is life. To me, a vacation.
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3 comments:
Go Wildchild!! You live your life as you wish!
And Jodi, your music request has been filled.
Sounds like the old Hal Ketchum song, "Mama Knows the Highway Now by Heart." Great attitude!
Contrast that with "Drivin' My Life Away" as sung by Eddie Rabbit.
Huh! Guess I'm on a country music kick today. Something about truckers seems to do that to me.
That's pretty cool for Wildchild. I have considered in a small way that reading random blogs is a sort of 'CB radio' for the computer junkies. A way of communicating with strangers. As well as a 'family' as the truckers have.
Weird.
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