Truck Driving Woman

Photo by 500photos.com.

Riding the Southwest Chief Train Three east from Los Angeles’ Union Station to the tiny stop of Lamy, New Mexico, I once again made an extraordinary acquaintance at our shared breakfast in the diner.

I don’t know her name. Probably she introduced herself as I did, but I was not focusing on what she said, impressed instead by her size, her large head of hair, and an implacable form of self-confidence I too seldom find in women.

She is, she told me, a professional long-haul truck driver, steering eighteen-wheelers with enormous trailers across big swatches of this county.

Her father is also a trucker and it seemed she had learned her skills from him, perhaps avoiding the torments of the truck drivers’ schools as vividly described in the February Harper’s Magazine in an article by Emily Gogolak titled, “Lost Highway: The Trials of Trucking School.” About the only hazard Gogolak didn’t encounter was sexism; she paid more than three thousand dollars at Changing Lanes CDL to train for and eventually, after many months of struggle, earn her commercial truck driver’s license. A lack of truck drivers is impeding shipping across the country, but the pay is now so low—not so in the past—and the hours are so long that companies like Changing Lanes have a hard time finding applicants. Almost all of those in Gogolak’s class were Texans, four out of five were responsible for child support payments and at least four had been to prison.

My breakfast acquaintance did comment on the way wages for long haul drivers have fallen, in spite of many job openings; neither she nor Gogolak remarked on a difference between wages paid to women and men. My acquaintance explained in her imperturbable way that because she has been driving for three decades, she is now able to choose which jobs she will accept and to some extent she is also able to set her own hours. With a berth and a microwave in her cab, she can take care of herself, but the loneliness of long hours on the highway can only be reduced by finding somewhere to park and eat with fellow truckers.

Since these huge trucks don’t fit under the canopies at drive-in restaurants, they are not able to access the short order food they prefer. My acquaintance described finding a parking place outside one such place and walking to the window, only to be told she couldn’t order unless she was in her vehicle. This was particularly difficult during Covid when many truck stops closed.

Another change she noted: now that most truckers have cell phones rather than CBs, they can’t communicate with each other as they once did, warning of traffic pile-ups and accidents, leading to more problems on the road. As so often it seems, the more we are connect electronically, the more disconnected we are as humans who need faces and voices to understand and respond.

I wanted to express my admiration for her independence and enterprise but I sensed that my praise would not be welcome. Like so many women, she is only doing what she has to do to survive and dealing without complaining with the inevitable difficulties.

So I’ll say “Bravo!” here and hope it carries to the eighteen-wheeler she is steering down some lonesome highway in the vast stretches of our country.

In Travel Amtrak