Overview..

Overall, my experience in trucking was somewhat bittersweet.

I had a hard time training with my trainer. He is a good guy and all but he switches from being friendly to reprimanding trainer personalities at the drop of a mistake. We will be talking, and i will miss seeing a sign because he is telling me something. My favorite is when i am coming into a exit ramp and i think he is attempting to coach me on the procedure, so while i am trying to listen to the coaching, i screw up my setup for the turn. Then he gets angry at me and starts going off on me about how i am a professional driver now and i cant be doing this shit, etc etc.

The other day when i had the mishap with a left turn and i almost ran into an on coming car, he starts going into a speil about how i almost killed him and how i would have been responsible for his death and the deaths of others. Then goes on about hiw he is a damn good father and husband and he intends to make it home alive and how i would have been responsible if he wasn't able to. Yeah thanks for that, guilt is not a good motivator for me, and layering it on, i feel, made that fucked up day worse.

I think a lot of our missteps with personality stems from the fact that he is a midwestern guy that goes to church and has a value set that is dramatically different than mine. On many occasions, i felt that he was treating me like one of his kids. I'm sure he respected me, but in my opinion, his teaching and coaching skills were not ones that i can deal with.

On top of all this, the hurry up and go shit that kept coming up was driving me batshit crazy. On one hand I am being told to look around and make sure of what i need to do so i can do it. So when i do, i get an aggrevated response that i am wasting time, going too slow, hurry up, get going. Then when i try to explain what I am trying to do, he looks at me and tells me he doesnt want to hear excuses, just do what needs doing. Now THAT shit is directly from my father in the past while i was growing up. I do not and will not respond to that shit well. I shut down a lot and bit my tongue. I am a student, im supposed to be learning, not back talking and being accused of "wasting time".

The company is all about being safe. Last I knew, being safe can't be done by going quickly and making snap decisions if you don't have the experience to back you up, which i dont, but my trainer kept treating me like someone who has done this before. I would like to think that being new and doing what i was able to do in a short time accounted fir something, but it felt that the congradulations were in short supply against the pile of criticism that kept being tossed my way. He would keep complaining about all the fuel that i kept wasting because of over-revving and not shifting properly. Im sorry, if that is truly a concern, stop fucking training so you can get your fuel bonuses, stop putting the blame on me. I am new to this, im not fucking up intentionally and you putting pressure/guilt on me makes me want to just drop the truck into neutral and floor the fucking pedal ti actuallt give you something to complain about. The nitpicking about how i was to blame for missing lights or turns because i was too slow at my decision making at times made me just want to scream.

Thr coupe de gras was when i gave him an answer to a question and he misheard me. Then proceeded to yell at me for not doing said task. When i repeated what i told him, he looked at me and said "when i give you a yes or no question, just fucking answer yes or no" As you might guess, that didnt sit well with me.

Just thinking back in some of this is getting me stressed enough to want to beat the shit out of someone. I'm currently sitting by myself at the McDonalds waiting for my bus and my heart rate us up and im getting more and more pissed off. So, if you ask me if i made the right decision, i would have to say yes. Today would have been driving over mountain day. I won't gather a guess on what would have happened if he gave me shit while going down a 2 mile 8% grade hill with a large drop off. I will let others guess and wonder for me.

I am a stubborn person, walking away from this, for me, was difficult. I don't really like to quit something because its too hard for me. Especially if i am the one who set the goal. I found my limit and i was honest with myself about what i ciuld and could not do. With the wonderful support of my wife, I was able to comfortably make this decision fir me and not anyone or anything else. I don't do well with 'trapped' for a job. I tend to start loathing things and finding excuses not to go do it. It happened when I worked fir the state of mass years ago and i already saw signs of me trying to figure out how to stay home longer than my scheduled time. I got confirmation that i did not burn any bridges at the company and that if i want to, at a later date, come back and try again, i have the option. I would have to think long and hard at this, right now i am trying ti exoress into words as to how strung out i feel and the reasons behind them.

Overall, it is a great field to work in if you are looking to challenge yourself. I started my journey as a tech man, i feel comfortable around technology. I may not understand it all, but it talks to me just fine. Trucks and i have a nodding relationship. We get along fine, but if i let my guard down,bthe fucker will try and take me out. Im not ok with that. Be that as it may, i am not trying to convince myself or anyone. I writing this to get it out of my head in some way to release the pressure.

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The saga starts to end..

After getting about 3 or 4 hours of sleep, i got up and talked to my trainer about hiw I felt and where U stood. It was a short convo and he respected my decision. I then called my fleet manager and explained to him what was going on. He asked if that was my decision and I said it was. So a bus ticket was purchased against my future earnings im supposed to get to send me home.

I had to pack my stuff up and get off the truck at the truck stop we slept at last night. While I waited for my auth form to be faxed, my trainer left to continue to deliver the load. Thinking that a cab ride was in my future, I talked ti the girl at the truck stop helping me with the faxes and she informs me that the greyhound station is located across the street at the McDonalds. So, the universe was all set about my decision and ked me to where I had to be to continue my journey home.

I am sitting at said McDonalds waiting for an attendant to come and give me tickets. I will be leaving at 3:30pm central time and heading to my finak destination of Daytona Beach, Fl. So my next little adventure will begin. Once I get my tickets squared away, I will be starting to write up my closing thoughts on my experience as a professioal trucker.

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This is it.

So i have taken my time and energy and sat back an reassessed my situation.

I am not happy with my choice of careers. I thought that I would much happier and more confident about doing this job. I am good at it for a beginner, I can drive the truck with a semblance of safety and competance.

However I feel that I am out of comfort zone and way out in left field. I feel that I am a danger on the road, if not in actuality then simply in my mind.

I am tired, frustrated, scared, uncomfortable and lonely. All I really want to do is go home and find a job there.

I can't honestly say that i have wasted time pursuing this. I learned a great deal about the job and about myself. I am not haopy that i lost half a year getting here, but i wouldn't trade the exoerience for anything

I still have to talk to my trainer about my decision and see what happens from there. If the ridicule continues, well, I only have to deal with it for a little while. I have to live my own life the way I want it to be.

Is this chapter of my life complete? I don't really know. I have a few more day of adventure before I close out,this blog officially, so we have some more reading to do. Lets take it day by day, fir I still have to get home.

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Accomplished

Do today i passed the last thing i needed to move on to the test i need to take to determine if i maintain employment here.

I needed to demonstrate a 90°/90° backup into a tight hole between two trailers. I did it, but there were still a bunch of snide comments when i would go to look at positioning and such. Apparently all the things I was told to do in class were all pointless as it wastes time at the shipper and consignee.

I am being given hard lessons on time management. The problem is that i am highly flustered about getting somewhat accurate results in the amount of time i need. Maybe i just need to be making up my own system to make sure i cover my bases.

I am tired and I am currently stuck at a shippers trailer area cuz i found a break air hose that is showing threads which puts the trailer out if service until its fixed. We have to wait til morning and drive down the street and get the hose repaired before we can drive.

Anyway, night all.

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The day after...

Today was a better day. My shifting was muchly improved and i didnt screw up too badly today. I was able to back into my first dock unassisted and all in all, today went by fairly well.

I have two more days minimum of training. Could be more, we will see. However, i will eventually get back to a terminal to test out. If i pass, cool, if i dont, cool. I will go back to tech for awhile if i can. Most of my mistakes happen because the trainer and i get talking and i screw up. Then i get called on it. It irks me alreadythat i screwed up and i am trying to recover, while i do, im getting negative feedback at the moment im trying to fix things and it fucks me up more. I sometimes wonder if i will screw up as much on my own as i do while with a trainer.

He commented today that he doesn't care if i think he is a good guy or an asshole, all he wants is to make sure i have the skills to not kill myself or others while driving. While on one hand i understand this, i don't have to like it.

That frustration is what is causing my doubt about doing this job. I can't even begin to make a system for myself because he has an established one that he uses and trains me on that one. Again, growning pains.

I am tired, i haye climbing up to the top bunk to sleep, its not as restful as it needs to be. Yet its the only place i have to sleep. The bottim bunk is like 2 inches wider all the way around and i dont have to worry about falling. I need home time and having a tech job is desireable due to being home every night.

Again, this might not be the job for me but i am too stubborn to just quit just yet.

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