I've been a trucker for the last ten years but now I am back home at "Camp Chaos" and I will be working at the Fontana terminal as a safety specialist. I hope now that I'm home I'll have a lot more time for blogging!


Email Me.
I check my email whenever I get a chance.

King Pins
trucker terms
mars pictures
e-trucker
prairie home companion


Blogger Buddies
punkin
comfortably crazy
California Fever

 
I feel sorry for Bear, he’s having a hard time riding in the truck all the time.

Yesterday, we were going through Tucson Arizona. My student was driving, I was sitting in the passenger seat, the jump seat. Bear touched my arm. I was on the last row of a pair of slippers I was knitting and I wanted to finish and put it away. I paused and looked down at Bear.

“Something bothering you Bear?” I asked.
“A little” he said, not looking at me.
“What’s the matter”, I said, looking at him and seeing a sadness in his eyes. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“It’s… It’s…just that… well, you sit up there all the time in the front seat. Your student sits up there all the time and I never get to sit up front. It just isn’t fair!”

Unfortunately, big trucks don’t have back seats. We have two air seats. (An air seat is a specially designed seat made for rough riding vehicles. It absorbs the shock of the bumps and gives us a comfortable ride so truck drivers don’t have trouble with their kidneys any more.) I understand why Bear doesn’t like being stuck in the back.

“But Bear”, I replied, “You are less than forty pounds, you would have to ride in a car seat, just like Amber and Suki have to do. Would you like that?”

Bear thought for awhile. “When’s the last time you saw a car seat advertised for ‘bears’?

I knew he had me there.

“Well,” I said, “Bears don’t usually ride in trucks either, or cars, for that matter.” … “Look, Bear… car seats are there to keep small bodies from smashing into the windshield in an accident. I should have you strapped into one even when you are on the bunk!”

“Why aren’t you in a car seat? You would do a lot more damage to a windshield than I would!” Bear retorted.

This stuffed fluff was getting the best of me.

“I’m in a ‘car seat’,” I shot back. “See this seat belt, if we were in an accident this belt would keep me strapped in my seat. I can put you in a seat belt on the bunk.
Then you wouldn’t be able to jump up and down on the bed like you love to do. I saw you do a really cool back flip the other day when you thought I wasn’t watching.

Bear did his ‘stare at the floor, make Tom feel bad’ look. “I’m just tired of this truck. I thought I would love riding in the truck. I thought I would get to look out and see all the sights. You haven’t let me see anything!,” he was really pouting now..
“How will I be able to write post cards to the kids at Amber’s school, if I can’t see out so I can see things to write about?”

“I’m sorry Bear,” I said “you’re right” “As soon as my student gets off my truck and gets his own truck, I promise to let you ride up here with me. OK?”

Bear shrugged his shoulders. “Where are we going today?

“Laredo, Texas” I replied.

“Are we there yet?”
posted by Tom at 10:22 PM