Spirit of the Road Read online

  Spirit of the Road:

  The Life of an American Trucker

  …and his cat

  2nd Edition

  Revised and Expanded

  Rick L. Huffman

  Text Copyright © 2014 Rick L. Huffman

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission from the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

  ISBN-13: 978-1492252368

  ISBN-10: 1492252360

  To protect the privacy of some who have shared stories and adventures with the author, some details and names have been changed.

  CMV Publications

  For Tonie;

  And for all the men and women who sacrifice more than most will ever know to deliver freight across the nation.

  A travelogue

  Contents

  Foreword to the 2nd Edition

  Introduction

  Trucking School

  Training with Ringo

  The First Delivery

  Week 1: Coon Dogs and the Lizard Man

  Week 2: Accident on I-85

  Week 3: School of Hard Knocks

  Week 4: Hooterville

  Week 5: Slip Sliding Away

  Week 6: French Lick and the Forest

  Detour: Trucking in a Winter Blunderland

  Week 7: Bear Creek, Egypt, and Kitty

  Week 8: Mountain Man

  Week 9: Trucking, Fort Rucker, and Einstein

  Week 10: Loafers and Burmese Chickens

  Week 11: Buckets of Mud

  Week 12: A Smoke Tarp at the Broken Yolk

  Detour: A View from the Cab

  Week 13: Take this job and…

  Week 14 and 15: Greener Pastures

  Week 16: Orientation and Merlin

  Week 17 and 18: Tragedy in Cross Timbers

  Detour: Drivers versus Dispatchers?

  Week 19: Life with Brian

  Week 20 and 21: No Trucks Allowed!

  Week 23: Avian Droppings

  Week 24: Low Times in High Springs

  Detour: Fitness, Hygiene, and Diet on the Road

  Week 25: Driver "Appreciation"

  Week 26: Dispatcher Bob

  Week 27: "Shagged" again!

  Week 28: Here Kitty, Kitty

  Week 29: Goodbye Dispatcher Bob

  Week 30: A Kansas Moon

  Detour: Lot Lizards

  Week 31: A Loose Nut in Texas

  Week 32: A Cracked Radiator

  Week 33: A Chicago Scrape

  Week 34: I Ain’t Got No Quarters!

  Week 35: Eat More Possum

  Week 36: Is that alligator staring at me?

  Detour: Spirituality on the Road

  Week 37 and 38: Kitty Foams at the Mouth

  Week 39: Roadside Emergency

  Week 40: Georgia Chicken Coop

  Week 41: Buffalo Commons

  Week 42: RC Cola and Moon Pie

  Detour: The Lonely Road

  Week 43: Macon Whoopee

  Week 44: New Jersey Manners and Flopeye

  Week 45: Squeaky Cheese

  Week 46: World’s Largest Truck Stop

  Week 47: Toad Suck Park and Beer Nuts

  Week 48: Kitty Goes to Jail

  Detour: The Image of Truckers

  Week 49 and 50: Searching for Elvis

  Week 51: Frigid in Fridley

  Week 52: Reflections

  Afterword

  In Memoriam

  Endnotes

  Foreword to the 2nd Edition

  First of all, I’d like to thank you for checking out my book. When I sat down in January of 2008 to begin the arduous task of piecing together my scribblings from the road into some semblance of coherency, I never knew I’d still be honing the edges of Spirit of the Road some seven years later. It has been a labor of both love and travail that has allowed me to cultivate my lifelong ambition to be a writer into reality. It has also pushed me to tackle other writing projects as I strive to grow and improve…which brings me to the purpose of a second edition.

  The reasons for a second edition are twofold. First, after reading the manuscript again over a year later, I saw many opportunities to enhance, update, and improve the work. The passage of time affords a more objective eye, and the gift of additional experience affords a more discerning one. I concluded that enough change was warranted to justify a second edition. As I continue to evolve as a writer, I remain committed to producing the best work of which I am capable. I am humbled and grateful each time someone is kind enough to buy my book.

  The second reason is because Kitty passed away in the summer of 2014, and it just seemed appropriate to make an update to that end since Kitty played a vital role in this story. I have included a heartfelt memorial to Kitty at the end of this edition.

  Once again, I’d like to thank everyone who has been gracious enough to support me in my writing endeavors as I work toward completing my first novel. It is the most difficult and challenging work I’ve ever done, but it is also the most gratifying. In saying this, I would be remiss not to thank Tonie, the wonderful woman in my life whose unwavering faith and support give me the strength, courage, and confidence that I could have never found on my own.

  I invite you to join me on a unique and life-changing journey as Kitty and I discover the surprising, uplifting, daunting, insufferable, frightening, and sometimes hilarious spirit of the road. I hope that you’ll be entertained and informed as you are along for the ride but, above all, I hope you’ll have fun.

  Rick L. Huffman

  February, 2015

  Introduction

  In October of 2005, I enrolled in an Alabama Commercial Driving School and began a new adventure that was invigorating, intimidating and, at times, even infuriating. I was probably one of the most unlikely candidates to become a truck driver that the world has ever seen. Not only had I worked in a sedentary job for the past 20 years, I had never driven anything larger than a U-Haul. To be sure, my skills at maneuvering any vehicle bigger than a Ford Focus left a lot to be desired. I once attempted to back a U-Haul to the door of my former girlfriend’s apartment. She finally grew weary of observing my struggle and offered to take over. While I can’t swear to it, I think that I could literally feel my testosterone level depleting as she deftly maneuvered the truck exactly where it needed to be.

  Meanwhile, I had spent the past 20 years of my life working in television broadcasting in various roles. While it had been exciting and challenging at first, the years had eroded my role into a thankless and suffocating rut. As an added garnish, fate had also grabbed my personal life by the nape of the neck and dunked it into the crapper for a humiliating "swirly." I seriously needed a change…a new experience. I can only chalk it up to chance that I ran across one of those Big Trucks Mean Big Bucks ads in the Sunday paper and, unlike the dozens of other times that I’d seen (and ignored) them, it caught my eye this time. If a significant change was what I needed, this certainly seemed to be the ticket.

  In the following pages, I will share the experiences from my first year on the road. This story runs the gambit from a wide-eyed rookie in CDL School to the eventual embracing of a new lifestyle at a dusty little truck stop in Crab Orchard, Tennessee. My loyal traveling cat began riding with me at the start of my fourth solo week on the road, and she would be with me for the remainder of my travels. In 1995, an abandoned kitten showed up on the doorstep of my Huntsville, Alabama apartment making an appeal for food. After weeks of feeding the little kitten, I finally took her to the vet to bring her to full health and claimed her as my own. Over the next decade, the little cat would accompany me through th
e peaks and valleys of life until we ended up rolling across the country together in an 18-wheeler. My road adventures would not be complete without Kitty at my side.

  There are over 3.4 million long-distance truck drivers in the United States and millions more in local delivery operations. Motorists share the highway with them every day yet, little is known about the lifestyle of a long-haul trucker outside of the inner sanctum of the trucking industry. Hollywood paints truckers as uneducated southern rednecks who are heavily adorned in denim and flannel. Through his tobacco-stained teeth, he necessarily hits on every woman he sees while hiding his wedding ring.

  In truth, trucking attracts people as diverse as the aforementioned stereotype to former doctors, CEO’s, bankers, and engineers. I even met a MENSA member with a reefer in tow at a Kentucky truck stop. The diversity among truckers is just as great as in any other profession. You never know what stories hide beneath the grimy visor of a truck driver...or who hides beneath it.

  The trucking industry is a rapidly evolving entity and, as I write this today, it has changed much since I first set foot inside that old flattop Mack with my first driver trainer. Whether it has evolved for the better is debatable and differing opinions are sure to be found depending on who you ask. In 2005, GPS systems exclusively made for truck drivers were not readily available for purchase. Some drivers used mapping software on a laptop or MapQuest, but most drivers still used a road atlas and written or verbal directions that were accurate only if you were lucky on that day. The continual piling on of more and more DOT regulations, the advent of electronic logs, and new safety programs that began with CSA 2010 keeps the trucking industry in a state of constant flux.

  I seek neither to champion the causes of truckers nor to disparage the trucking industry. The possible occurrence of either is merely coincidental to the telling of the story. I make no claim that my view is the correct one or that my opinion reflects that of all truckers. This is simply an account from one driver’s perspective, and I tell it from the viewpoint of a company driver. The only guarantee I make is that the story will be told with honesty and from a singular perspective.

  It is said that everyone has a story to tell. This is the story an American trucker…and his cat.

  Rick L. Huffman – June, 2013

  Trucking School

  The faint aroma of cheap carpet deodorizer provided but a thin veil to the underlying stink of old cigarette smoke which clung to everything in the meager motel room like a blood-engorged tick. The anxious sounds of the medical staff in a makeshift ER erupted from the small television set as Hawkeye and Trapper John raced to mend wounded soldiers in a MASH rerun. The offensive smell and the noise from the television were in the back of my mind as I watched traffic zoom north and south on Interstate 65 from my motel room window in Priceville, Alabama. Tomorrow would be the first day of CDL School where my introduction to the world of long haul trucking would begin. I knew my life was about to change abruptly.

  To say that I knew nothing of trucking would be putting it mildly. To be sure, my understanding of operating a big rig was proportionately equal to my understanding of quantum physics. I had no idea what to expect on the first day of trucking school, but I did suspect that this new chapter of my life would not be boring. I could not have been more right.

  I was anxious on Monday morning as I entered the unremarkable brick building that would serve as my training headquarters for the next three weeks. A worn American flag and an Alabama state flag whipped hastily in the breeze. A thick cloud of dust swirled up from the large dirt lot in back of the school where a row of about a dozen eighteen-wheelers patiently awaited their new occupants.

  As the routine indoctrination procedures of the first day progressed, I slowly became familiar with some of the other students. The most striking revelation was that the students came from all walks of life and from wildly varied backgrounds. The Hollywood stereotype of the dim-witted redneck trucker with a bulging cheek of chewing tobacco was already being challenged. As the morning progressed, some of the students shared their stories with one another and I formed a bond with Alan, a former engineer.

  Alan was a transplant from England and, although he had lived in the United States for sixteen years, his Cockney accent remained undiminished. As I would later discover, his accent became even more pronounced when he was aggravated or nervous, sometimes to the point where I had trouble understanding him. Alan was laid off from his engineering job and, at 54; he had experienced the frustration and despair of searching for new employment in competition with much younger candidates. Like me, Alan had a lot riding on the success of this new gamble.

  Alan and I were often kept amused by the antics of Steve, who was the biggest comedian of all the students, both literally and figuratively. The jovial and inviting personality of this former football player belied his imposing ebony frame.

  “Why did 18 truckers go to a movie together?” asks Steve with a mischievous grin.

  “I don’t know,” we reply.

  “Because it said under 17 not admitted,” answers Steve with an enormous roar of laughter.

  I never saw Steve without his trademark perpetual smile. He was always fun to be around and he, usually, kept everyone laughing, especially Ray.

  Ray was a foil to Steve as his rail-thin form barely lifted him to the height of Steve’s armpit even with the aid of cowboy boots. Despite the slightness of Steve’s wee antithesis, Ray proved to be one of the ablest students in the class.

  Regardless of the varied personalities, everyone here had at least one thing in common. Each person sought a better life for himself or, he wanted to get his life back on track from a prior misfortune. It came as no surprise when camaraderie quickly developed among most of us.

  The indoctrination procedures and physicals consumed all of the morning, and then it was time to begin classroom studies. Classroom training during the first week would prepare us for the written portion of the CDL test, and the next two weeks would introduce road training.

  The classroom instructor was a rotund middle-aged fellow named Ron. Ron immediately conveyed an air of confidence despite a distracting habit of constantly rubbing his goatee. He wiped at it with urgency, as if he were trying to remove an erroneous splash of pea soup from his chin. However, it soon became apparent that Ron had probably forgotten more about trucking than most of us would ever know. Thanks to his expertise, most of the fifteen students passed the written exam on the first attempt. Eventually, everyone passed. Now, it was time to drive the trucks. Oh boy…

  Alan and I bantered nervously in the crisp morning air of the big day. White asters at the edge of the training yard danced to and fro in the fresh morning breeze as the new day cast its first light. Both of us were nervous, yet excited about the new challenge before us as we anxiously awaited the arrival of the instructor. We would spend the first couple of days in the yard learning straight-line backing and 45-degree angle backing.

  The instructor entered the yard as the sun peeked over the east horizon and waved for us to join him at the row of trucks in the yard. The rank of ancient long-nosed Freightliners and dilapidated Volvos brought to mind an image of old battle-scarred warriors who should be resting in retirement, but have been recalled to active duty to form one final phalanx.

  The instructor’s name was James, who was a little younger than Ron, but whose shoulders were slightly hunched as if he’d been carrying a cinder block before arriving. He had a cookie duster mustache and spoke in a nasal monotone, which inspired me to gulp my coffee with increased urgency. James, as we soon discovered, had a penchant for talking about women’s breasts. He didn’t just talk about them—he analyzed them: the shape, the size, the feel, the texture, the rating system, the color, the roundness of the areola, the smoothness, the pear-shaped ones, the apple-shaped ones…well, you get the picture. At first, the mammary musings of James were amusing but, after a time, it began to get a little creepy. He wore his obsession with "ogling the oompahs" like
a sandwich board. While I freely admit my appreciation for female breasts, they are rarely exposed as a topic in one of my regular conversations. James, however, spoke of breasts as if he were casually talking about the weather. Nevertheless, James was our instructor now, and I fervently hoped that he had more knowledge to bestow upon us than the most plausible route to "Wapbapaloobop World" in Las Vegas.

  After half an hour of verbal instructions, James climbed into a timeworn Volvo laced with rust and fired it up. The quavering roar of the diesel engine drowned out the sounds of morning as it declared itself the ruler of its antediluvian domain. Even Steve was dwarfed standing next to the sputtering giant. James maneuvered the wheezing vehicle between two rows of orange cones and told us that we’d be learning straight-line backing today. He then pointed directly at me and asked for my name.

  “Rick,” I answered.

  “Okay Rick,” grinned James, “you’re first—jump in!”

  I climbed up into the shuddering vehicle with trepidation while some of the students wished me good luck, and others wagered on how many orange cones I’d crush. James emerged at the window and shouted a reminder at me over the noise of the gravelly engine.

  “Steer into your trouble… if the trailer goes right—steer right, if the trailer goes left—steer left.”

  With that, he climbed down from the vehicle and left me to the task. The old Volvo now shook with authority as if it were a rodeo bull eager to dismount me in less than eight seconds. The mirrors vibrated so violently that I couldn’t even see the cones; they appeared as orange blurs.

  I took a deep breath and began my backward trek. Amazingly, I managed to negotiate the 100-yard course without hitting any cones, but it didn’t take long to discover that this was trickier than it seemed. Another hundred yards and there’s no doubt that I would have killed some cones. Over the next few days, I practiced and gained confidence. Then, I was introduced to the bane of my existence: 45-degree angle backing.