Sunday, February 20, 2011

The Best Thing About Trucking . . .

. . . is being home on a Sunday night and making myself some real, hot food in my own kitchen. I don't love to cook unless it's a social activity with persons I really like, or unless it's about 20 minutes from turn-on-the-stove-time to sit-down-and-eat-time. Tonight I made some homemade onion and mushroom and barley soup. I used some vegetable stock for broth, and leftover barley I had cooked yesterday, but otherwise it was from scratch and it took about 20 minutes. An hour and a half later I was hungry again, so I made some three-cheese pasta. From scratch. From a pot. Not a paper bag. No napkins, no receipt, just a small pile of dishes I honestly don't mind washing in my own sink. 20 minutes. Life is good.

The other best thing about trucking is having a glass of wine with dinner. I don't drink when I'm out in the truck. A good trucker friend told me when I was a rookie that he never has a drink when he's under a load, even if he's parked for the night and legally has a few hours in which he could, even if he's grounded by a Rocky Mountain blizzard for 3 days, etc., because he's still responsible for the truck and the load and if he would have to move them for any reason he would have himself a real dilemma. (For CDL drivers the legal limit is half what it is in most states for anyone else, and a first-time offender loses his license for a year, which means he has also lost his job and probably his career. I don't personally know any truck drivers who are even a little bit careless about it.) I thought my friend's policy sounded very wise and I adopted it. Which makes that glass of wine or cold beer at home taste all the better; and all the more better because it is at home.

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