10-4 Magazine May 2022

The Veteran’s View: By Dennis Mitchell Spring is in full force and the sunny days are finally warming my old bones. There hasn’t been so much rain as to dampen my spirits or drown out my enthusiasm for trucking. This is the time of the year when we all want to gas up the John Deere and take a spin on the lawn mower or dig up the garden beds. That is if you can afford it this year. I may have to take out a second mortgage just to fill my pickup truck’s gas tank. Everything is new and green around here. Farmers are working around the clock, planting their crops, so that means the freight boards are a little more plentiful with their trucks out of the system. This is the month when I remind all of you drivers to stay vigilant when in farm and ranch country. The number of tractors and implements on the roads greatly increases, and accidents can happen when you least expect it. Some of you complain when you get held up on a two-lane, waiting behind a line of traffic, or following a farm parade lead by farmer Joe and his big red diesel-fired chariot. If you are pulling a reefer and have a load of high dollar produce on, I don’t want to hear a peep out of you! Without farmers we don’t eat, and you don’t truck. End of story. The same goes for bucket haulers out there hauling fertilizer in and last year’s grain to market. All you cow trucks and bull haulers, you know the deal – load them like a rail car and drive them like your head is on fire! I could go on and call out more of you, but I think you get the point. The American farmer is every bit as important as we drivers, and farm safety is no joking matter. Every year, far too many farmers and farm workers are injured in crashes with the motoring public. And I don’t have to look far to make a connection with those statistics. My wife’s uncle was struck by a car while moving a tractor from one farm to another. This happened when he was in high school and, unfortunately, uncle Keith lost his life as a result. Much of the farm labor is younger and may not be as experienced as they should be. We can’t do anything about their level of competency, but we can ensure that our actions don’t infringe or impede their movements. Take a minute and slow your roll – the world will wait. Roll your window down and breath in some of that fresh country air. Just for the record, the driver of that farm machinery is someone’s father, brother, sister, or mother, and they are just as loved as you, so please slow your roll when in the country. Also, don’t forget to wave as you pass, because the folks down there on the farm are friendly. Speaking of rolling down the two lanes and taking a stroll in the sunshine, Barb and I were returning from the truck show last month down in Louisville, Kentucky, when we stumbled on to a couple of surprises. The first one was when we were trying to find a place to eat dinner that had a sit-down restaurant. You know, the kind with real waitresses and no paper plates. Is it too much to ask to have a refill on your soda or maybe use real silverware? How about one with a buffet and a salad bar? Oh, I know, it’s just out of the question nowadays since Covid spoiled all that. One can dream though, can’t we? We had both eaten before leaving the motel, so two hundred miles later, I was feeling kind of hungry. I’m just not into fast food or junk food, so we were playing that age old husband and wife “What are you hungry for?” game. “I don’t know, what do you want?” I found out years ago the husband doesn’t stand a chance of winning this argument, but we play along anyway. I had suggested a few choices, but none of them really 54 10-4 Magazine / May 2022 MEMORIES AND MILES