One of the Joys of Trucking

By Sandy Long

I have had it with winter! Enough all ready with the snow packed roads, vehicles sliding past and ending up in the ditch and with having to shovel out drop trailers so you can get hooked up to them. Also, I am tired of having to deal with fighting trailers away from docks when the dock apron is icy, pounding on brakes to unfreeze them and standing outside in below zero weather fueling. I am specially sick of the drivers both male and female, yelling at people on the cb for going too slow on bad roads. I AM READY FOR SPRING!!

Spring I think is my favorite time of year. Grass comes up that particularly vibrant shade of green, trees look like their limbs are veiled with gauze as the new leaf buds appear and spring flowers peep their heads out of remaining residual snow to give a hint of color to the dirty white. I specially like seeing the new calves and foals playing buck n jump in the emerald pastures as their mothers graze the fresh grass and the little bunnies scoot out of brush along the side of the road.

Along with the coming of spring, other joys are available to those of us who are tired of the cabin fever we get cooped up in our trucks all winter. On a lazy running weekend in the spring, yard sales pop up along the two lanes in small towns everywhere and if one can find a place to park, one can take a few minutes to just browse and visit with other people enjoying the fresh sweet air. If there is no parking, one can always slow way down and table shop as one goes by.

With the milder weather and the absence of snow, I can indulge in my favorite on the road hobby, rock collecting. The spring showers will clean the mud off of the rocks so I can see the pretty ones easier, though I will have to watch for snakes sunning themselves on the sun warmed stones. I think with pleasure of doing my favorite at home outside hobby that comes along with the spring, fishing. I don’t care if I catch anything, but there is nothing better than going to sit by a lake, where you cannot even hear a truck, and enjoy nature and the sunshine.

Spring allows us to open the truck up and let it air out the accumulated odors while we do a thorough spring cleaning. We can get a good truck wash and know that unless some freak weather occurs, the truck will look good for a couple of weeks instead of a day or two. The fancy trucks will be going by gleaming in the sun instead of being coated in salt and ice…And, we can finally take that extra heavy ugly coat and snow boots home on our next trip in.

Spring is wonderful! I await the sight of the first robin, and the tulips and daffodils showing their gorgeous color. Butterflies appear as the weather warms and the honey bees come to take the pollen off our windshields when we are sitting still. The thought of fresh cut asparagras from the farmers market at home makes my mouth water and going to the farmer’s market brings the promise of fresh ripe tomatoes and other vegetables to mind that will come in a few short months.

Spring brings a lightness of spirit to us truck drivers. We no longer have to worry so much about bad roads and whether we will have to shut down due to weather. Exercise enters back into our breaks as we can get out and take a walk around a rest area’s pathways. We will have more daylight so we can take our favorite book out, to eat our lunch and sit in the sun at a picnic table somewhere.

I think that spring affects us lady drivers more than the males. We are more in tune with the spring season and perhaps enjoy the sights of this season on a different, softer level than our brother drivers. We ladies are also more affected by seasonal affective disorder, where the lack of sunlight makes us a tad depressed. With the longer days, we feel better about ourselves and our lives. Spring is a time of rebirth and renewal and has always been a more feminine season. Like caterpillars coming out of our cocoons, we lady drivers shed our ugly winter clothes and spring out of our trucks dressed in more vibrant colors and we take more care with our appearance because we don’t have to worry about gloves and hats anymore.

Spring is just around the corner, I await it with great anticipation and will enjoy it to it’s fullest, I hope you enjoy the springtime joys of trucking too.

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