Keep On Trucking
Back in the mid 70s when i was a little kid my parents separated, my Father had retired from the military and had a little money saved and we went on a 2 year long road trip sleeping in a VW van and camping in national parks and in the middle of nowhere, we finally broke down driving through Oklahoma around 1978 and thats where we stayed. my Father got a job running a small warehouse for a family that owned 3 truck stops, this was back when trucking was still king and owning your own rig and being an independent trucker was a good life style. my Father took me into work with him all the time in the summers and on the weekends and i grew up around that place and the people that worked there and regular drivers that always stopped in. from the time i was probably about 10 my Father would bring me in and have me help out picking a list of items the first truck stop which was on site needed and taking them across the big lot to them, and once a year he would have me help do inventory at all 3 truck stops one in Oklahoma City, 1 in Harrah Oklahoma, and 1 in Amarillo Texas which required a yearly road trip and spending the weekend there. by the time i hit puberty my Father was very sick and had to pull an oxygen tank around everywhere we went and when i turned 16 i officially started working at the truck stop too. i started working there at about 10 and started on the books at 16 and worked there till i was 25 when my Father passed, about a year before he died they switched insurance companies and the new one would not take my Father. so after all those years of paying life insurance so that i would have something after he was gone my Father came home from work one Friday, went into the hospital Saturday morning, and passed about a week later with 800 dollars to our name. i am 52 now and broken down and beaten up and exhausted and still got about 800 dollars to my name, i spent about 15 years "officially" 9 working at my first job and watching the fall and decline of the American independent truck driver and the truck stop going out of business soon after that. and 23 years at my current job in a huge supercenter chain store watching the slow death of my amazing country and the entire western world on so many levels. i have always obeyed the law and kept out of trouble, i have always worked and been responsible, i have bever smoked or drank or done drugs, and i have nothing to show for it. i am just some relic of America where i am lectured constantly on my privilege and how easy i have it and all the evils i am responsible for. my Grandfather served in WWII, my Father lied about his age and served in Korea, my much older half Brother served during Vietnam, and i serve ungrateful entitled millennial and Gen Z customers that hate America and people like me.