Confessions of a Wannabe Truck Driver

Alright…so I spent a splendid weekend in Missouri. All of you out there are now thinking, “how do you have a splendid weekend in Missouri?” Well, first of all, you have to realize how long you’ve been in your home town without leaving it. This should depress you enough to make you want to leave town and go anywhere…it won’t matter where, just anywhere. Then you have to weigh your options of where to go. Financially, the places you absolutely want to go will probably be out of your reach. Let’s say I wanted to go to Hawaii…I can’t afford to go to Hawaii and pay my bills for the month. So you whittle it down to where you can go. Finally, you wait for a friend to ask you to go with them to said place. Once you have the backup of someone going with you, you are set. You are away from your home town, not spending yourself poor, and with a friend(s)…splendid.

Seriously, I went with my best friend Jon and his wife to Missouri to see his little brother play some college football. Let me see if I can some it up in a few sentences. It was an eight and a half hour drive and we took my increasingly unreliable truck (smart). We stayed in the Quality Inn which is not as bad as it sounds, but not much better than you think. My room was relatively nice…apparently Jon and Bekah’s was not. We went to dinner at a not terribly good, but terribly bad Mexican restaurant (you don’t realize how good you have it living in the melting pot of Texas until you dine out in other states). Got to see Jon’s little brother’s place, which was awfully nice. Got up the next day and had the free continental breakfast. Went to the college bookstore to get some game day gear, which was interesting but not terribly noteworthy. The game was not great (they lost), but it was fun to see unpretentious college football. The weather was weird, but nothing that couldn’t be handled. We had a little tailgate after the game. Then we went over to Michael’s for game night and a night cap. Other points of interest: we went to Wal-Mart twice while we were there; I had a mini-fridge in my room that served to keep the beer cold for a day; Missouri is actually a really pretty state; my truck made it all the way there and back without incident.

Ok, now what you really come to my blog for…pointless interesting thoughts from me. I realized something while making the entire drive there and back myself. I didn’t have to; it was more of a choice than a requirement. I didn’t want Jon to drive my truck (I really don’t like anyone driving my truck but me). And, when Jon and I made the trip to ATL earlier this summer, he drove the whole way there and back, so I was repaying him for his diligence with my own. All of that is not what I realized, though. I realized that if I would have had less ambition in life (or more, depending on how you look at it) I could have been a truck driver. Being behind the wheel for hours at end doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t have a regular sleep schedule (or a sleep schedule at all). I kept thinking the whole time driving there that I would have loved to have a CB radio. I mean, truck driving would be the way to go, if I hadn’t spent so much money on a college education. Jon even pointed out a couple of truck driving schools and companies with “drivers wanted” signs out front. I just don’t know if the trucker lifestyle would work for me in the long haul (pun).

Another thing that struck me during this epic drive was the obtuse amount of adult video stores along the interstate in Missouri. Interstate 44, which runs the length of Missouri across the southern portion, has a section running from Springfield to St. Louis called “Main Street U.S.A.” This sounds quaint and fun doesn’t it? It gained this claim to fame because it is the part of I-44 that runs almost parallel to Route 66. It is an amazing drive through the foothills of Missouri passing nice little towns with lots of tourist traps. Well, apparently “Main Street U.S.A.” has porn stores every 50 miles. These range from broken down shack type places to the more swanky joints with 24-7 video arcades (if I have to explain what an arcade in an adult video store is, then you don’t need to know). This wasn’t as astonishing as the fact that once “Main Street U.S.A.” ends going west on I-44 past Springfield there are adult video stores every ten miles. Really, how many adult video stores do you need on one piece of interstate? I guess if I was a truck driver, I would know.