Saturday 26 February 2011

Til Far

I dag var jeg ude og handle i frokostpausen - og på Walmarts parkeringsplads mødte jeg HAM HER:


Og han kørte i DENNE HER:


Og selv om der var rodet, måtte jeg gerne kigge indenfor:

Man kan ikke så godt se det på billedet, men (i modsætning til danske lastbiler) man kan fra førersædet om i soverværelset. Hvor han har et fladskærms TV.

Hans lastbil var ret lille, faktisk - en af hans truckervenner kører sammen med sin kone (de der husband-and-wife teams er vist ret almindelige) og de har badeværelse og toilet i lastbilen!!!

Min nye ven kunne fortælle at han ikke har noget hus, eller nogen fast adresse i det hele taget. Han har en postboks i den by hvor hans datter bor. Ikke at han får meget post, efter at skilsmissen gik igennem. Han har ikke nogen bankkonto, alt bliver betalt kontant. Eller nu han tænkte over det, så gik hans løn ind på et kort (betalingskort), så han havde vel en konto af en slags.  Livet på landevejene er ikke det samme mere. For 20 år siden var det som et stort broderskab, hvor folk hjalp hinanden. Hvis man punkterede var der jo ingen mobiler men der var altid nogen der standsede. Nu er det company policy at man ikke standser; risikoen er simpelthen for stor. Men han har kørt i over 35 år og har tænkt sig at blive ved til han dør.

I snit kører han 5000 km om ugen. I et forsøg på at komme op på det tal i løbet af mine 6 uger her har jeg tænkt mig at tage Lille Røde ud på tur i weekenden- så vi skrives ved på søndag!




This post is for my Dad - who I'm sure wishes he had been with me in the car as I pulled up next to this guy in the Walmart parking lot. I've never seen the inside of an American truck, and even though he hadn't cleaned it recently, he said "sure, you can take a picture". Mind you, one of his friends has a much bigger truck. With a bathroom!!!  My friend likes his truck though. So much, in fact, that he lives in it - he just has a post box in the town where his daughter lives. But he doesn't get much mail since the divorce went through.  And he doesn't have a bank account, he only uses cash....or, come to think of it, his wages are paid into a debit card, so yeah, he guesses he has a sort of bank account. On average, he drives just over 3000 miles a week - and in an attempt to nudge that figure during my 6 weeks here, I'm taking my beloved Little Red car out for a spin this weekend. So, no post tomorrow - but see you Sunday!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

If you like long-haul trucks, you should have seen the one that brought parts to the wind farm project in Texas. I've seen a lot of trucks, but this was the best I've seen. The drivers were a husband/wife team. They had a house, but spent most of their time on the road, so they got a truck to make them feel at home. It even had a small kitchen. Talk about a home away from home! And the outside of the truck had an incredible flame paint job. Which I loved, because it matched my tat! ; )

The Blogless Sister said...

Awesome! This guy also told me that his friend's truck had a DECK-now how that worked, I'm not sure, but I guess it was like the fancy caravans I've seen on TV. Fantastic!