This morning (Saturday) i took my Phase 1 driving skills test and passed with 95%. Now we do some written tests over the weekend and then get assigned a Phase 2 trainer early next week. I'll either be on the road with that person for two months (if i go company driver) or 10 days (if i go truck lease). It may sound like a no-brainer, but i haven't been able to completely decide. I really DON'T want to be responsible for fuel, repairs, taxes and everything right out of the gate as a rookie driver, which would be the case if i was a lease driver. Yet at the same time, the notion of being on a truck with a trainer for two months is not very appealing either. I'm dying to be on my own. Maybe that's just a function of being TOO crowded on a truck for a month with MJM and F/M.
In either event, it sounds as if i get home in the next week or two, which is desperately needed for a variety of reasons -- appointments, paperwork, and most important, seeing the girls. I almost feel as if i won't recognize them!
Feeling lonely and sad today. Not sure why. Probably because i don't really have anyone with whom to intimately share this experience. I guess that's one reason i feel so compelled to continue doing this blog -- it allows me to have the perception of sharing this experience and my thoughts about it with other people; something i didn't think was that important but i'm realizing that it is vitally important, at least to me. Writing is very cathartic for me. Not only does it give me a written record of the experience, but it allows me to process thoughts and feelings and helps them crystalize into distinct notions. It brings experiences into focus, rather than have them just sitting out there as fuzzy feelings. And for whatever reason, that is important to me right now.
Have a new roommate in Salt Lake. A muscular black guy by the name of Dennis but he goes by Wes. What IS it with people in the business and names?? Dennis/Wes is one of those people who literally, NEVER stops talking. He's been in prison and is from Chicago, and most of what he says is started with MF'er, ends with MF'er and has the phrase liberally sprinkled throughout. As in: "That MF'er, he took the MF'ing truck and drove down the MF'ing highway like a MF'ing bat out of MF'ing hell!" I hear that's how they talk in Chicago. And if Dennis/Wes is any indication, they aren't kidding. Also, everything is "nigger this" and "nigger that". As in: "Yo nigger, where you from, MF'er?" He's a really nice guy though, and is also here for his Phase 1 upgrade to Phase 2. He is a great roommate and is very tidy. We are in a two-person room, and my side looks like Joplin, MO compared to his side. He hasn't complained...yet. (Hey MF'er! Clean up your MF'ing side of the MF'ing room, MF'er! What you think this IS, nigger, a MF'ing garage sale?).
I also got my hair braided again by Kendall, a black gal from Alabama who was in my initial school class and is here for Phase 2 upgrade, as well. Funny, i haven't had a single white room mate and all the people i've become friends with (except MJM) have been of one ethnicity or another other than white. Being from mostly white Oregon, that is a unique experience.
Anyway, more thinking to do, and it's going to be a long, long weekend given that Monday is a holiday. Not sure how i'm going to kill the time, since there really isn't all that much to do here.
Stay safe.... Sleep is the only remedy for fatigue.
KWA
hang in there Ken! If you ever show up to Sierra Vista, Arizona give me ring. 520-507-6929. We'll have you for dinner.
ReplyDeleteLaura (Nelson) Gill