This is kind of the opposite of the previous post of Old Timers. But this was different. These men I respected. My grandfather farmed a little and boarded horses for extra income, but never had to depend on farming to feed his family. I have the utmost respect for farmers and older drivers. But I do realize that the world will never be the same as it was yesterday and it won’t be the same tomorrow. Seems like some of these old guys don’t realize that. I think that was my only point in my last post.
But, I’ve wanted to write about this for a long time, it sounds a little corny. But here it goes anyway. Long ago when I first started driving, I walked in this little truck stop café in Lawton, OK. Not even a truck stop. Just a diner with a big dirt parking lot. The parking lot was filled with owner-operator trucks and old pickups. I walked in and sat at the counter. It was a little awkward, I felt a little out of place. Here were all these truck drivers and farmers from the area eating breakfast in this little diner which was packed. It was like the old days in a small town where all the farmers got together in the morning and gossiped and complained about the world in general. It was odd in the way that here were the men that fed the country and the world despite the good intentions of our government. Beside the farmers were the independent drivers that carried their grain and cattle from their farms to the co-op or the feed lots. And despite more good intentions of our government these men drove their trucks and farmed their land like generations before them. Despite all odds against making a living out of providing for the rest of the world. Government regulations were in their lives more than any other industry. And each man was his own business and could go under tomorrow because of the slightest fluctuation in grain, cattle or fuel prices. The people that make the money are the middlemen, so called brokers. Men and large corporations that buy from the farmers at the cheapest price they can get away with, and paying the truckers that move it the cheapest that they can and trying to sell the commodity around the country for the biggest buck. They don’t make or grow anything; they take the commodities from others and sell them for more.
So many regulations and so many people against these men, but they still do it. They still farm, they still truck because it’s what they love to do. It’s something that needs to be done. I’ve heard and talked with a lot of drivers and there are several that have taken a break and tried to do some other “normal” job. Home every night, home cooked meals daily, able to go fishing every weekend. But they come back to the road. It’s something that gets in your blood. It fits every description of an addiction of any other kind. I’m sure farmers get the same addiction. Most of it is the independence. No one looking over your shoulder. No time clock to punch. Most other jobs you can’t really see the importance of the job itself. Farming and trucking, you know you are part of the economy. You see it everyday. People in the big cities think they are better than small town folk. Small towns support big cities in so many ways they don’t realize all the “back woods” folk that allow big cities to have traffic jams; restaurants don’t grow their own food downtown. I could go on and on.
Now after driving for a while and owning my own truck, my situation still doesn’t seem quite the same as these men. Sometimes I feel like an old hand, other times, I’m still part of the newbie driver generation, but I am still learning.
