CDL Update

Wow, I'm tired.

Putting in my apprenticeship driving as part of a team out of a WalMart Distribution Center serving WalMart and Sam's Club Stores in 7 states.   We deliver groceries 7 days a week to 1, 2, or 3 stores on each run; a run being from 500 to 1000 miles round trip.

The reefer trailer that WalMart uses is divided into three compartments.  A run might be a Dairy/Deli run, in which the compartments are at +30, -20, +30; or it might be a Meat/Produce run where the compartments are at +40, +30, +40.  And supposedly the loaders at the Distribution Center load the truck in order, but even so, if the first store needs only 3 pallets out of the first compartment and one pallet from the second compartment, you have to unload the entire first compartment to get the one pallet from the center compartment, then reload everything.  And the driver just watches, we are not allowed to load/unload.  Usually the store employees could care less about what is happening to the pallets belonging to another store, not their problem, eh?  Arrgghh!

Anyways, the schedule is setup so that a team running around the clock can hook up a reefer, deliver to the stores, return to the DC, drop the reefer, and hook another and keep going.  WalMarts deliver at night, Meat/Produce before midnight and Dairy/Deli in the early morning; and Sam's delivers between 5 AM and 11 AM.

Oh, and sometimes we have to bring groceries back to the DC.  The other day we finished delivering to to Sam's and then went to a Meat Packer and picked up a load to bring back to the DC.   Then a couple of days later we went way out in the country and picked up 6 pallets of fresh sweet corn at a farm to bring back to the DC.

As an apprentice I am not allowed to drive between midnight and 6 AM, so I get the noon to midnight shift.  Some of our routes cut across corners of a couple of national parks, some of the most beautiful real estate in the U.S.  And this is the best time for seeing the wildlife; we see a sign that says "Watch for Big Game" and then come around a corner a mile later and see a big yellow Deere or Caterpillar or Komatsu tearing up the road, quite a wonderful sight to see.

Although I must admit to now having seen the deer and antelope play.  The only buffalo I have seen have been roaming feed lots.  And I did pass a gate that said "Home on the Range", about an acre of dirt and prairie grass and a small garden shed.

I have about another week of my phase one apprenticeship left, then I return to school for another test and three more days of classroom instruction before adding on 60 days of my phase two apprenticeship.  Then I will be able to drive my own truck.  Nothing against the people I have been teaming with, it is just very disorienting to wake up and have no idea where or when you are.  And to awaken when the truck is going over a very rough patch of road (way too common); your first thought is "Lord, am I going to die now?" then a sigh of relief as you realize that the truck is not off the road.

Trucks are pretty important.    Think about it for a moment.   It would look pretty silly if ship canals had to be dug to every WalMart, or railroad tracks laid to every grocery store.   Trucks bring everything the "last mile" to the store.   The food you eat, the clothes you wear, your TV’s and stereos, the cars you drive, the homes you live in, all that was brought to you by truck.  All of it.  There are a lot of them out here on the highways, carrying the food you eat to the store you buy it at.  A truck driver brought the materials that built your home, brought the equipment used to build your home.

Every day, for pennies a mile, truckers are dodging the silly little two and four wheelers, trying not to run them over even though they seem to be deliberately trying to cast themselves under our wheels. I’ve had people pull out from behind me, pass me, cut in front of me  by feet, and then stand on their brakes to drop into an off-ramp, while I am desperately standing on my brakes so I don’t squash them as they pass right under my nose.  What did they gain?  Two feet?  A split second?  But they were also a split second away from eternity, and I’m not sure they even knew it.   Loaded, I weigh about 80,000 pounds.  40 tons.  And your car weighs less than 3 tons.  I weigh over 10 times more than you do.  Want to get stared down by a pro linebacker?  Most people don't, but they don't seem to mind staring down a big truck.

Truck drivers get paid by the mile.  We don’t get paid by the hour.  We are going as fast as we can, as safely as we can, to deliver the goods that people need.  We are not trying to slow everyone else down.  Don’t look at us as an obstacle in your daily commute, but as a person trying to do their job as safely and quickly as possible.  We’d rather be at home also.  Well, some of us anyways.