I have had some adventures in my lifetime and I am sure that there are more to come. I anxiously await those. The other day as Chris and I were driving we were talking about things in the past, days gone by and how many things we have experienced over the years. One of those things was the chance to have our own business for awhile. I “got” to be the basic office manager type person and one of my duties was to be at the office early to make sure that someone was there for the trucks that arrived. The rest of the guys didn’t come in until later in the morning and Chris was often gone doing sales calls and the like so it fell to me to open the warehouse and get the place going for the day. Not a hard or difficult job and it was usually nice to be there before anyone else came in.
One day in particular sticks in my mind and I thought I would share it today. I had just gotten there and opened the doors and a semi rolled in with a load of matboard . Well I was not the forklift driver and the guys were due in any time so since the driver was early I offered her a seat and a cup of coffee while she waited for the guys to arrive. As we talked she asked me if I liked cats. I told her I loved cats and had a couple of my own. Out she pops to the cab and comes back in with a kitten! Of course I oohed and ahhed over it and made the appropriate animal loving noises. Then she tells me to come on out to the cab so she can show me something…….(now this is where Chris jumped all over me later for doing what he thought was a dangerous thing—he thought she was going to abduct me or some such nonsense). I went to open the passenger door and she told me to come around to the driver’s side because the LITTER BOX was there!!! Oooooookkkkkaayyyyy. So in I popped into the cab of this really nice sleeper truck to discover a mama kitty and 5 kittens all living together in this semi cab. I was a little surprised to say the least to see a whole family traveling together while this lady trucker drove from here to there.
She then proceeded to tell me all about life in the truck world and I think she was a pretty successful driver as she had her cab paid off and had a good life AND 6 cats to boot! The thing that really hit me was that she told me all about how you can buy these little ovens that plug into the cigarette lighter and how she had some Tuna Helper cooking right now—it would take about 3 hours to get done but it worked just fine. All I could think was how on earth did she keep the cats out of it and didn’t it just drive them nuts to be in a confined space with that tuna smell for hours on end? Oh well.
Anytime I see a trucker on the road, especially a woman trucker, I think back to that and wonder how many cats might be in that cab. You can’t make this stuff up and I have met my fair share of colorful folks and look forward to meeting more. Every one has a story.
Since I now actually know a female trucker, Donna, from DonnaHup.com it makes it even better to think about this experience. Donna has started a new series called Trucker Tuesday. If you want to learn more about trucking and Donna’s experience as a truck driver check out her posts here.
