I delivered in the San Fernando Valley two days before. It took an average of two to three days to get a load, once I delivered anywhere in California.

Everything comes into California, and with a limited amount of manufacturing going on, shipping goods out of the state meant a lot of truckers sucking down coffee at the nearest truck stop as their dispatchers told them, "Call back in the morning. I might have something for you tomorrow."

Two to three tomorrows was my average wait for a load, once I got to LA, which was close to NAVL's yard. I wouldn't be told to go to LA, but I knew my chances were better to load quicker out of the Los Angeles area. I knew where I wanted to be while I waited. Not only did I mostly load out of the LA area, once I was in California, but I had Disneyland, the Anaheim Angels, and dozens of restaurants serving every kind of food imaginable, with in walking distance of NAVL's yard.

If I was going to wait, I wasn't waiting at some out of the way truck stop. If I was going to wait, I might get a motel room for a night or two. There were a lot worse places to be than Anaheim.

No matter what I did while I waited, I needed to check in with my dispatch each morning at eight. I could expect to be told, "Call back in the morning," at least twice. That gave me the entire day to pick and choose where I wanted to go. Having a room meant having a phone at my elbow. At a truck stop, you stood in line with dozens of drivers who were calling their dispatchers, hoping for a load.

I lived out of my truck, so I could afford a motel room when I wanted one. The other benefit of getting a room, if I didn't pick up when they rang my room, the desk took a message, and a little red light on my phone was blinking when I got back.

The message was usually, 'Call dispatch."

There were few places in the country that I'd sit still for a load for two or three days. Luckily, the place that took the longest to get loaded was a nice place to be. After two days anywhere, I wanted to start moving. I didn't make a dime until my wheels began to turn again.

The third morning I checked in with my dispatcher right after getting up. I felt lucky, but the dispatchers words were music to my ears.

"Joe, go to the NAVL yard. Drop your trailer there. Back up under trailer 11099. It was dropped there last night. Go inside and tell them what trailer you're after, they'll have your paperwork. Take it to Ritz Carlton, St Petersburg, Florida. You deliver in five days. Think you make it, Joe?"

"I think so. Thanks," I said, and I was ready to go out the door.

A drop and hook at NAVL's yard meant no loading time, that usually tied you up for much of the day you were put on a load. I drove into the yard at 8:45. I dropped my trailer in an empty space. I drove down the row where the loaded trailers were dropped, stopping in front of mine.

I backed up under it listening for the fifth wheel to lock in place. I shifted into first gear, pulling against the trailer to make sure it was solidly hooked. The trailer should hold my truck from going forward. Establishing the solid hook, I jumped out to put up the landing gear that held the trailer up. I climbed in between the truck and trailer to attach my glad hands that would activate the trailer's brakes.

I popped off my brakes to pull the trailer forward and out of the hole it was in. I popped on all the lights, and did a walk around the truck and trailer to make sure all the lights were working. Once I was satisfied that my inspection was complete and I was ready to rock and roll, I drove back to the entrance, set my brakes again. I climbed down and went into the office for my paperwork. The man on duty walked back out with me. He checked the trailer number against the bills of laden.

"You're ready to go, Joe. Have a safe trip."

It was then I thought about the last time I was in NAVL's yard in Anaheim. I drove into the yard to pick up another drop and hook. Once I came in the gate, I knew something had gone seriously wrong. Three trucks, each with the driver door open, sat in a line in the entrance lane.

No one needed to tell me what to do. I opened my door and jumped to the ground, racing into the offices and warehouse.

At the counter leading to the warehouse, there were three drivers, the entire office staff, and the warehouse men stared at the TV. I stood behind the group to help them stare

It was January 28. 1986, I pulled into the lot a few minutes before noon.

"What happened?" I asked.

"Shuttle just blew up. No one knows what happened to the astronauts. That teacher was on it."

It's one of those days when everyone alive at the time could tell you exactly where he was.

I was just arriving at NAVL's yard in Anaheim.

Today was a lot easier day than that one, and as I drove out of the yard, I remember something one of the astronauts said, after a man told him, "You ain't doing nothing a monkey hasn't done."

The astronaut, I believe Alan Sheppard, said "Yeah, but that monkey don't know he's sitting on top of a bomb."

It was 9:15 and I was loaded and on my way. A drop and hook was a vacation, but there was more than one reason why this was a gravy load. It was going 3000 miles. I rarely got more miles on a load, and many times a load went a few hundred miles, but there was another reason I was smiling.

I had five days to deliver. I could drive it in little more than three days. The other bright spot in this load, it was going to Florida. I knew the route and I knew where I would stop for fuel and the best restaurants when I wanted to eat, but I would be making limited stops, which meant I'd get off of I-10 on the afternoon of the third day. I'd drop down on to highway 98 east of Mobile, and I'd have nearly two days to go the final 500 miles.

In twenty minutes, I was moving up the ramp on to I-10. It was a little after 9:30, and heading out of the Los Angeles basin meant little traffic on the east bound lanes, while traffic lanes crawled moving into the city. For the next 2500 miles, I'd never be more than a block or two off of I-10. It was one of the best super slabs in the country, and I moved my speedometer up to 60, and that's where it would be each time I got back on I-10, after stopping for fuel and what food was available during my dash to Florida.

By the time I reached I-10, my plan was forming in my brain. I knew where I'd get off of I-10, once I reached Florida. I knew Route 98 from my childhood. I'd been on it hundreds of times. Going at my usual speed, and having five days meant, once I was on route 98, I could take my time going from Pensacola to Fort Walton Beach, were I spent my childhood summers with my grandparents.

I'd been driving a truck for five years. I'd never had a load that gave me an opportunity to travel over such familiar Florida roadways. I'd have enough time to take it all in, before I kept moving on route 98, until I reached Bend, Florida. I'd go south out of Bend and I'd end up in St Petersburg. Having two days to go 500 miles wasn't much of a reach for a trucker.

Having five days to go 3000 miles would normally be way too much time, but I knew why I got so much time, because I was delivering to a high dollar hotel that was about to open its doors.

I'd wait in a line of trucks to unload once I got to St Petersburg. There would be forty or fifty trucks that was carrying the furniture for the hundreds of rooms in a place right on the Gulf, or close enough to advertise the Gulf of Mexico is right out the back door.

These were special delivery contracts that brought the furniture to high end businesses and hotels. Once all the trucks were unloaded, the Ritz Carlton in St Petersburg would put out the welcome mat. The final step, before opening their doors, was placing the furniture in the rooms. When the furniture is loaded on to a trailer, it is wrapped in a blanket by the loading crew. There would be no plastic or cardboard to dispose of. The blanket came off the furniture before it's carried off the trailer to be placed into which room it was scheduled to go into.

One truck was unloaded, and it pulled out of the way, and the next truck pulls into place. The driver who just unloaded, pulls to one side, folds his blankets, and then, he calls dispatch to report he is ready for his next load. On an assignment like this, I know what's coming, and I might be there a day or possibly two days if too many trucks get there before I do. No matter how many trucks unload at such a location, within two days they'll all be unloaded and the business is ready to open.

When you stand in a line of trucks waiting to unload, you know that you are all going to be waiting for a load. There probably aren't enough loads in the Tampa area to get this many trucks loaded, so you might need to drive two or three hundred miles to get on another load. I was once sent to South Carolina after delivering in Florida. They had to pay me loaded miles to do it, but if a trucker stood his ground and said, "No way," he was going to start getting offers to sweeten the pot.

Like California, Florida had little manufacturing. In a state that was all about tourists, seafood, and fresh produce, there weren't a lot of places doing any shipping out of a state that you could get into but it was going to require a wait to get out of Florida on a load.

Since I ran what was called blanket wrap division, this was the kind of load I was accustomed to. I knew the good side, I didn't need to touch anything, and I frequently ran into a crew that had unloaded one of my trailers before, and it was nice to see someone I knew, no matter where I went.

Because I ran all the super highways in the country dozens of times, I knew how long it took to get from here to there, no matter where it was. A trucker remembers where the cheap fuel is and where the food is worth stopping for. When you're on the road 24/7, you need to know as much as you can learn to save time and money on a run.

When I drove up the ramp on to I-10 in LA, I already knew where I'd get off of I-10, once I reached Florida. Because I had two extra days, I'd do something to use up that extra time. I stayed at sixty miles an hour all the way. As I reached Florida, 2500 miles from where I got on I-10, I got off the ramp that took me to highway 98 in Pensacola. I knew the road and I knew the places from my childhood. I'd been on highway 98 hundreds of times when I was a boy.

I would use the extra time to enjoy a pleasant drive along the Gulf of Mexico. It was 500 miles to St Petersburg. Highway 98 ran along the Gulf for several hundred miles. I'd take it to Bend, Florida. I'd go south out of Bend to St Petersburg, but I had place to stop along the way.

The water was a rich green, the horizon was crystal clear, and the the sky was royal blue as I drove through Pensacola and across the bridge that would take me to Fort Walton Beach. The traffic was moderate, the road was smooth, and I recognized the landscape I hadn't seen in years. It was a little like going home to a place I loved.

I could drive all day without stopping to pee, if I was careful not to drink too much coffee. I'd been a trucker long enough to know I wanted to have two full tanks of fuel, a full belly with snacks easy to reach, and all the necessities taken care of before starting a run. I didn't stop for twelve hours once a run started. By that time, I was ready to fuel, get a hot meal, and a pee. Once done, I could drive into the night without much in the way of traffic to get in my way.

I had logs that said anything they needed to say if a smokey pulled me over. Since I stayed close to the speed limit, close enough for smokey not to notice me, I rarely saw smokey, except where I weighed or when I entered or left a state.

I drove according to what my body told me. I knew when I was too tired to drive. I was a professional truck driver, and I wouldn't drive if I knew I wasn't safe doing it.

Letting some bureaucrat in DC tell me when I could and couldn't be behind the wheel was a fast road to the poor house. If I had to sleep when I was told to sleep, I'd never be rested, I'd never get anywhere, and I'd never be safe to drive, because I couldn't sleep on demand, but I could pull over when I felt too tired to drive.

Smokey knew what I knew. If you weren't going an unsafe speed, or driving like a fool, he was likely to leave you alone. He rarely bothered me. I got two speeding tickets, and one log violation in the decade of the 80s, when I drove. I was late delivering once, after a breakdown. I was never late picking up a load.

When I dropped down on to Florida's route 98, I knew the road. I'd been on 98 a hundred times in that neck of the woods. Route 98, which would take me through the place where I spent summers as a boy. My grandparents house was a few blocks from highway 98. The lived a block from Choctawhatchee Bay. The bay emptied out into the Gulf of Mexico at Destine, three or four miles across the bay to the Destin bridge. As the crow flies, the Gulf of Mexico was a mile away. As a boy, everything we did centered around the bay and the Gulf. We swam, water skied, and fished there,

We took speedboats to the far side of the bay, where we walked along the shore, staying in the shallows as we dipped crabs out of the bay. With five of us dipping, it took an hour to get two bushels of very angry crabs. Getting back in the boat, we crossed back to where we came from, rushing the crabs to Granny, who was waiting with a pot boiling, and in went the crabs.

Everyone in the vicinity was soon cracking into crabs to get at the luscious crab meat. It was the kind of social event you might have at the end of the day when you lived near the Gulf. The laughing and happy talk came with the celebration of summer in Fort Walton Beach, as we planned the boating, skiing, and swimming that we'd do tomorrow.

The happiest days of my childhood were spent in that place, doing those things, while me and my brother stayed with our grandparents. Fort Walton Beach was a doorway to adventure for two teenage boys. The Gulf of Mexico was a magic place. It was clean, fresh, and it brought us to life in a way we never were at home.

The saddest part of summers at our grandparents, came when it was time to go home, but nothing got people laughing and enjoying a summer evening like a crab feast.

As weather went, it was hot and humid each day. It rained between three and four each afternoon. Than it cooled enough to make it through the rest of the day. No matter what we were up to, it got our complete attention. Fort Walton Beach was the kind of place where life moved slow enough that you could squeeze in many activities each day. People moved slow enough to breathe in the fresh salt air, and stop to look at the clear turquoise waters. It was a place where you never got bored, because you were in paradise.

There was no way to recapture those days, but I could stop there, look at it, stop my truck to let my feet feel the familiar sand. I could smell the smells of the air and the sea mingled together the way they always had and probably always would. There was no smell like it.

For an instant, I was a boy again. For a second, I was back there. I felt how it once was.

I have a truck waiting. I have a load to deliver. I'd love to linger longer, remember more, but it's time to go. You can't live in the past, especially if you're a trucker with a delivery in your future.

Route 98 took me through Fort Walton Beach, Destin, and close to Panama City, as I moved toward Apalachicola, which was where Florida's panhandle met the Florida peninsula. Going south, once I reached there, would take me to Tampa and St Petersburg. The Gulf of Mexico would always be close on the right all the way there.

Route 98 is two lane with a grass shoulder once I move beyond Panama City. It's plenty big for a big truck but without much room to spare. Traffic is light and almost nonexistent the further to the east I travel.

Every few miles there was a park, where cars could pull off and take a break. There was a picnic table, a large trash can, a horseshoe gravel driveway for easy in and easy out. They weren't large enough to get a truck into one, but there was enough room near the entrance/exit, where you could get a full size rig off on the shoulder.

The Gulf was always a few dozen yards behind the abbreviated park. I pulled over once the traffic disappeared almost completely. I pulled off my boots, leaving them at the picnic table. I doubted any one would stop before I came back. I'd seen two cars in the last hour. I walked on the sand and stepped into the shallows. It felt wonderful. I didn't stop twice in an afternoon, while on a run, in ages.

I remembered the hazards of walking in the sand on my way back for my boots. I got not one, but two sand spurs in my foot. I sat at the table and pulled out the burrs. I shook my head. those spots where I pulled out the stickers were going to itch for hours. I put on my socks and pulled on my boots.

Well, my feet are clean, I thought.

Once I changed into a short sleeve shirt, whether in California or Florida, I put my hat on the bunk and left it there for the days I was up to it in warm weather. The cowboy boots supported my arch in a way that kept my foot from aching.

I foolishly asked a gray haired driver, 'Why do all you guys wear cowboy boots?"

"We know our business, Sonny. Once your foot gets to aching in those sneakers, throw them away and try cowboy boots, and your foot won't give you any more trouble, Rookie."

It two weeks for me to be limping and rubbing on my right foot. I remembered that trucker and how he disrespected me asking an honest question. Another driver told me, 'Get a cowboy hat. It'll keep the sun out of your eyes no matter where you are or where the sun is. A cowboy hat is better than any high dollar sunglasses you buy. Ball cap won't do it either.'

I got rid of my tennis shoes and ball caps after about a month. I keep shoes for walking around in, but I rarely take off my cowboy boots. I can walk around in them just fine.

Once I climbed back up into the driver's seat after my wading, I realized, I didn't need a break. I just took a break because I had nothing but time. It wasn't a condition I was too familiar with.

I'd been trucking long enough to take everything in stride, but I'd never had a run that got me so close to where I came from, and where I spent the happiest days of my childhood. No, I wasn't sightseeing. I was a professional truck driver and if I wanted to see something. I parked my rig. Being on a secondary highways meant being in local traffic, but I came 2500 miles in three days. I had two and a half days to get the last five hundred miles. Intended to take my own sweet time to drive it.

That left me plenty of time to lollygag and stop as often as I liked, but once I got beyond the turf I knew, it had to be something special to get me to stop for it. I was still a trucker and I still had enough miles in front of me to keep me on the job. I often got on secondary roads if it would take me where I was going and allowed me to see something I wanted to see.

I was not a pedal to the metal kind of driver. I drove with in five mph of the speed limit, and I kept moving at that speed until I got where I was going. For me, taking it easy and not running on the ragged edge of being out of control meant I kept moving and didn't need to stop at every truck stop. I can't count the number of truckers who passed me every couple of hours along the highway. While they sat drinking coffee and chatting up the waitress, I kept moving, and then they caught me yet again.

Truck driving isn't hard if you like driving and don't mind being on time for pickups and deliveries. You do that, keep your equipment well maintained, you too can be a trucker. I was one. I loved it, and I'd seen the country from north to south, and east to west, and back again.

I loved the good old USA,

It had little to do with my political persuasion and everything to do with perception. Politicians were hard on everyone, but the country was easy on me. The one thing I remember about driving a truck to Florida, and I was usually driving from the north going south, and it always seemed to be winter. When I crossed the Florida line, I stopped to roll down my windows and put on a short sleeve shirt. I loved the fresh sweet Florida air, and it was always warmer than where I'd been.

Along about the time I saw signs for the Indian River, I could smell the oranges. For five bucks, I could get a big bag of Indian River oranges. They'd be gone before I left Florida, but I'd have a good time eating on them. Florida had more faces than any other state. It had a little bit of everything.

This wasn't one of those north to south loads. This was a west to east load, and I didn't often get a chance to drive in this direction, when I was coming from California. It was balmy when I left California. It was moderate weather all the way across.

It was after Panama City and I was still a dozen miles from Apalachicola. There was less traffic the further I got from Panama City. The day remained clear, my windows were open wide, and my thoughts were on a highway I hadn't been on in twenty-five years. I'd been hungry for a couple of hours. I'd pull over if I ran into a restaurant near Apalachicola. It would need a big parking lot.

As I closed in on Apalachicola, I wasn't expecting to see a place to eat yet. That's the thing about driving for a living, you never know what's around the next turn in the road. I spotted a red pickup truck off in the distance. A tall slender man stood behind the open tailgate. I wondered if he needed help, and I dropped my speed.

If my stomach hadn't been growling, I might have been less surprised by the sign:

Oysters, Quart, $10.00

I was going slow enough that it was easy to stop about thirty feet behind the pickup. It wasn't really red. I calculate it was maybe twenty years old or so, and the paint looked as though it had been sandblasted some time back. It was a flat red with no shine to it at all. From the driver's seat, I could see about thirty quarts of oysters in the bed.

I popped on the air brakes and let my cowboy boots drop down on the asphalt.

The man's eyes were on the truck since I saw the pickup. I'd gotten over as far as I dare, and I had one wheel solidly on the grass, but my left wheels were on the pavement. With little traffic, I didn't think a smokey would drive by out here. If one did, he'd stop to give me hell for parking like that.

"What you got there?" I asked the man as I walked up to the tailgate.

"Turnips," he said, figuring it wasn't a question I needed an answer to.

He looked pleasant enough and he said it with a smile.

"Me with my stomach growling, and here you are with one of my favorite foods. Are you real, or am I daydreaming you."

"I reckon I's real. I was real when I put my pants on this morning."

"You put on your pants and went out to get all these oysters?" I asked.

"Out at three. Shucking them about noon. I comes out here to sell 'em. Not much traffic and folks have no trouble pulling over. You, you're not able to pull over so easy."

"Where there's a will, there's a way," I said.

"You're an oyster man?"

"I am an oyster man. Been one all my life. My daddy was an oyster man."

"You get all these oysters today?"

"Yep. Out at three, shucking them about noon. I comes out here to sell 'em. Pretty good spot. Lots of people see me and stop. Not enough traffic to keep anyone from pulling over."

"That's a hell of day," I said.

"How many hours a day you drive your rig each day?"

"Sixteen, Eighteen hours some days."

He laughed.

"Hell of a day we work, ain't it?"

"Sure is," I said, seeing his point.

I loved what I did and time was timeless. I had a hunch he felt similarly about his work.

I looked at one of the quart bottles. I mean you couldn't get another oyster in one of those quart jars with a pile driver.

"I got a problem. I can't eat an entire quart. I won't waste good oysters, What do I do?" I asked.

He reached into the bed of the truck and he came out with not one, but two spoons.

He smiled.

"I love oysters. I reckon I could give you a hand if that would help any."

I smiled.

"One quart of oysters please," I told him, and he popped a top off of the nearest quart jar. He dug an oyster out with one of the spoons and he handed it over.

My mouth was watering since I saw his sign.

I took the spoon with care, not wanting to dump an oyster on the ground. I looked it over. That sucker had to be three inches in diameter. Just the right size for my mouth.

"I like the way you do business," I said.

Lifting the spoon as I opened wide, It hit my mouth, slid back to my rear teeth, I chomped down on it and chewed it as it slid slowly down to my stomach. Oh my. I closed my eyes to savor the flavor and when I opened them the oyster man was getting an oyster for himself.

"What's your name, my friend?" I asked, before he got the oyster to his mouth.

"Willie Wheeler," he said, tilting his head back to make the oyster disappear.

"I'm Joe Buck."

He had a look of ecstasy on his face, which expressed about how I felt about his oysters.

"You can call me Willie. Everyone does," he said.

He tilted the jar toward me. I dug in with my spoon.

"As good as this is, if I had some hot sauce and a cracker, it would be perfect."

The oyster man reached into the bed of the truck, pulling out a big bottle of Louisiana hot sauce and a box of Sunshine crackers.

"I do like the way you do business," I said.

I took a cracker, added one fat juicy oyster, giving it a couple of dashes of hot sauce. Tilting my head back, it dropped on the back of my tongue, where I bit into it as it was on it's way to my stomach. When the oyster hit bottom, a blast of favor burst into my mouth. Oh my. It was ambrosia for the soul.

"I'm from oyster country. Chesapeake Bay, but I do believe that these are the finest oysters I ever put into my mouth. I never met an oyster man, Mr Wheeler. You are a good man to meet."

He laughed.

"God makes 'em. Willie harvests 'em. Apalachicola oysters are hard to beat."

I dug out an oyster, got it the way I liked it, and it followed the half dozen I'd already eaten. I had no sense of being full, but I was as pleased as I got over food. It was a satisfying meal, but I wasn't done yet. I started to sweat a little from the hot sauce, but it was a good sweat. My stomach gave off the most wonderful glow.

I forced myself to eat one more as we'd almost reached the bottom. The oyster man stopped eating to be sure I got my fill, but I'd had my fill, and I was just packing it in because they were there.

I finally put down my spoon with two fat oysters remaining at the bottom of the jar. It wasn't polite to talk with your mouth full, but I did have a question or two, now that I met an oyster man.

"That was a fine meal," Mr Wheeler. "I do thank you. How much do I owe you for the extra."

"Give me five dollars. You let me have enough for lunch. Five is fine."

"How long have you been an oyster man?" I asked.

"All my life," he said, after giving it some thought. "My daddy was an oyster man. My granddaddy went oystering with my daddy. I went oystering with my daddy too," he revealed.

"How old were you when you first went out with your daddy?"

He took a minute to consider the question.

"I was five the first time I went out with my daddy, and his daddy. We have a little cove off the beaten path, and it ain't far from the house. We gets the oysters there. Ain't exposed to much of the garbage people tosses into the nearest water. They're too lazy to look for a place like our cove. The oyster ain't got much to do but grow plump and juicy. Best oysters around, I reckon." he said.

"My daddy bought the oystering boat from the white man he worked for. Man was going to retire. He told daddy, "won't sell it to no one but daddy, cause he'd gotten rich with my daddy's help. He'd let daddy pay for the boat as he could. My grandaddy was a sharecropper up Alabama way. Daddy was born there and helped his daddy, but once he was growed, he told grandaddy, 'I ain't no slave. I won't work like one.' He came down here and went oystering after a few years. My granddaddy's daddy was a slave up there. He got himself freed by Mr Lincoln. Granddaddy said, Mr Lincoln shouldn't have bothered. Once his daddy was free, he went to work for the same man who owned him. Only now he only got enough out of it to feed his family a little worse than when he was a slave. Nothing changed except for not being able to earn enough to live off of."

"If Lincoln had of lived, it would have been different," I said.

"I believe it would have been, but he didn't live, and we got what we got. One thing is for sure, Johnson and Grant weren't doing nothing for us. That's how Jim Crow got his start."

"Hard to believe people are that cruel to each other," I lamented. "Don't take no more energy to be nice than it does to be mean."

"We wasn't whole people. What did the paper say? We was three fifths of a people. What kind of foolishness is that. Once we was free, weren't no different, maybe worse."

"You give a trucker a lot to think about, Mr Wheeler."

"Call me Willie. Everyone does," he told me again.

"No, I think a man like you should be called Mr Wheeler. You've earned respect."

"I just dredges up oysters, shucks 'em, comes out here to sell 'em. It's what I do."

I took the cash out of my pocket and I put a ten dollar bill on the tailgate.

"Lunch is on me, Mr Wheeler. I've never had more interesting company or a better meal. You take care now, you hear."

He was watching me when I walked back to the truck and swung up into the seat. With the engine running, I did a quick check of my mirrors before getting my rig back on the road.

I don't know how many cars passed while I ate, but I heard two or three. There were probably more, but I was too involved to hear them. There was no one in sight now, and I waved as I passed the red pickup truck. I shifted into second, and third gear before looking back in my mirrors.

The oyster man had been watching for my eyes to show up in my mirror. He gave me a sweeping wave that had me smiling. I didn't know if he was as fascinated with me, as I was with him, but I rarely had a more fortuitous encounter as a trucker. I never knew what was around the next curve.

It surprised me what I could learn by stopping to talk to a men. My world had never included many interactions with black men. Mostly I talked to one while doing business with him.

Mr Wheeler got me thinking about how cruel some people are. I knew where I was, and I knew American history, but I never heard it told the way the oyster man told it.

It was definitely eye opening. I was well fed and pleased with my day.

What a wonderful way to make a living.


      For all you four-wheelers out there, keep the shiny side up and the rubber side down, and I'll see you on the flip-flop.
      Joe Buck



Send Rick an email at quillswritersrealm
@yahoo.com

More Joe Buck Tales

Rick Beck Home Page