Kirkella to Calgary - 08/31/09

Big sky day on the prairies.  I wished I had a plastic bubble over me rather than the cab of the truck.  Not a cloud all day, just blue sky and prairies.  I get lost in myself on days like this.  Just set up the cruise and take it all in - no radio, no ipod, no phone, no CB - just cruisin' - very cool day.

 Took this shot just west of Brooks, Ab. at the rest area after doing my last drop of the day in Brooks.

It was a busy one though.  Over a thousand kilometers and 3 drops.  Another busy one tomorrow too.  Tomorrow it's into the mountains for some interior work.

Thunder Bay to Kirkella, Mb. - 08/30/09

I've been off for a few days. I'm always surprised at how tired I feel the first couple of days back out on the road. Takes a little while to get back in the groove. Funny, but it's the same way when I get home off the road. I like to take at least four days because I spend the first couple going around in circles not knowing what to do with myself. All those little things I think about on the road that I want to get done when I get home seem to overwhelm me. That shouldn't be. Those little things are just that, little things. They still get to me though. Life is difficult. I know, I know, don't sweat the small stuff.

Last couple of days have been busy. I left Friday night (08/28) and have to be in Regina tomorrow morning - 2800 km. Been feeling a little melancholy today as it's my daughter's birthday. Although we celebrated together the other day I often feel I'm passing the important things in life as I fly down the road. It's a job hazard, I know. The whole point of been out here is to support the people you care for - that's the financial reality. It's somewhat of a paradox though. How do you support someone when you're not there ninety percent of the time? Life really is difficult. Life is difficult: that's my new mantra.

Brandon to T-Bay: 08/21/09

Man was I feeling tired today. Thought it might have been the weather in Winnipeg - cold, cloudy and wet again - but I'm sure it was the extra long run I went for earlier in the week when I was in Sicamous. I started running a little over a year ago for fitness, sort of fell of the wagon last winter then took it up with renewed passion in May of this year. Now I'm addicted. I like it. Problem is my brain still feels like a 30 year old but my body let's me know in no uncertain terms when I overdo it. For the most part I've learned to take rest days to recover but with improved fitness comes the feeling of been "bulletproof". That's usually when I get into trouble. (:

Today was very weird weatherwise. Started of sunny in Brandon. Then cloudy, cool and wet in Winnipeg. Then sunny again as soon as I got about 50 km east of the Peg. One of our business partners I was talking to today said he's never seen so much cloud and so little sun. Weird that it always seems to be isolated around Winnipeg. Maybe they will have a warm and dry winter since they have had a wet and cool summer? We can hope. Warm is not a word that comes easily to your lips during the winter in Winnipeg!

Medicine Hat to Brandon - 08/20/09

My favourite time of day is the early morning. I love taking in the sunrise. The light at that time of the day is awesome. Just east of Maple Creek I got into some ground fog. It sat below my windshield as I drove into the sunrise giving you the feeling you were floating in a cloud. Very surreal. As you broke out of the fog all of the tall grass in the median and on either side of the road was coated with large beads of water backlit by the sunrise. Amazing when your moving at 60 mph and you can still see that detail. I love this job. Now I know why so many people like to cycle across the prairies. Moving slowly through that experience would be even more amazing. We were not designed to experience life at 60 mph. Funny, seems more and more people want to move through life at an even faster pace than that.

For a couple of hours after that experience I mulled over that thought. I got to thinking about the hours of service we live by and a prevailing mindset that feels 16 hours in a shift just isn't enough time to allow you to get things done. Starting your day at six or seven in the morning and been able to work through until ten or eleven at night seems like a long enough day to me. I'm not sure I even want to work that hard to earn a respectable living. More on those thoughts later. There was an interesting feature article on the Today's Trucking website this month regarding hours of service. You can check it out here.

The rest of the day panned out as most days do. No major surprises or catastrophes. Although I wanted to end up in Headingley not Brandon but I spent a little too much time stopped over in Regina. C'est la vie. There is always tomorrow.

Addiction or Conditioning?

I've struggled composing this post. I was originally going to share with you how easy it was for me to stop smoking. I soon discovered that time had tainted my memory. Stopping smoking remains one of the most difficult things I have ever undertaken and also one of the most satisfying. It has been almost 9 years since I stopped. The process I went through was far more than just ending an addiction to nicotine. The physical addiction, as it turns out, was far easier to give up than the habit itself. By that I mean the emotional dependency. I had conditioned myself to smoke over the course of my lifetime. Hook them when their young and you hook them for life. That was the maxim that defined my habit. Smoking was part of my self image. I liked to smoke. I enjoyed smoking. But I knew it was creating and causing negative health issues in my life. I needed to change. But I didn't want to. Sound familiar?

I have realised that every time I made the effort to stop smoking up until that point I was only treating the physical addiction. I never addressed the real craving I had. Every time I lit up I was filling a desire in my mind for something. I was curing my stress. I was ending my boredom in that moment. I was giving myself a relaxing moment. I was taking a break. So every time I quit I was forcing myself to stop doing something that I really enjoyed doing. That's a recipe for failure. How do you ever stop doing something you really enjoy doing and why would you want to? So I changed my mindset. I gave myself something that was more important to me than the enjoyment of that smoke. I didn't realise it at the time though.

Three or four months before my fortieth birthday I remembered a story told to me by a woman I worked with in the early 80's. She stopped smoking and never went back to it by making the act of quitting a gift to herself. A birthday present. I remember her saying it gave her a different outlook, a different approach. So I committed myself to the same approach. Once I made that commitment to myself an interesting thing started to happen when I lit up. My resolve to stop became stronger and my desire to light up became weaker. I started to see that I was giving myself a gift of good health not giving up a part of what made me who I was. For the first time I really wanted to stop smoking. I'm not saying this was easy when I reached that fateful day of my fortieth birthday. I was pretty sick for a couple of weeks. The diffference from all the previous efforts that I had made was that I had no desire in my mind to start smoking again. I found myself wanting to not smoke. I had unwittingly found a way to break the conditioning I had built up over my lifetime. For the first time I thought of myself as a non smoker. Does that make sense to you?

Think now about this trucking lifestyle. Whether we are talking about issues of health, hours of service, speed limiters, or any other hot button topic, we are often stuck in a vicious cycle. A negative mindset that can be destructive in so many different ways. After 10 years in this business I've learned one thing that I'm certain of: Truck driver's love to drive down the most difficult of roads. I think it's the challenge. I've also learned that the best driver's in this business are always able to find a detour around the difficulties on those roads. That's a lesson we can all apply to our own personal paths. Life is a journey filled with many difficulties and many rewards. We can follow the same roads day after day or we can break out of that groove and try something new, something different. That new path may have a reward at the end that was unlooked for. The tough part is that the new path you discover usually looks like a donkey path through the mountains when you first notice the turnoff.

Happy Trails!!

Choosing A Healthy Lifestyle On The Road

Truck drivers have a life expectancy 10 to 15 years less than the average North American male. That is a grim statistic. Average life expectancy for males in North America is 76 years. Women live an average of 4 to 5 years longer than men. Obesity, smoking, fatigue, lack of exercise, sexually transmitted disease and poor eating habits are the prevalent reasons for reduced life expectancy in our profession. That information does not come as a surprise to those of us that have worked as drivers for any length of time. It is generally accepted that this is the lifestyle of the trucking industry. More and more of us are no longer willing to accept this lifestyle that puts us on a path to poor health and a shortened life. That been said, living a healthy lifestyle on the road is no easy task. It is very difficult. It requires a commitment and a lot of self discipline. I can speak to this from experience. How many of you have tried to quit smoking, to eat healthier, to diet or to get some exercise while on the road only to find the changes add more stress to your day. We tell ourselves that we don't have enough time to live a healthier life. So we revert to old habits convincing ourselves it is either too difficult or not worth the effort to change. We accept the status quo.

It is possible to change. There is not a magic wand to wave or a miracle pill to swallow. You start by recognizing the adversity, difficulty and discomfort you must deal with in your everyday life. There are many hardships we have in common as drivers. Stress, anxiety, fatigue, separation from family and friends and physical discomfort to name just a few. Be honest with yourself regarding the suffering you endure on a daily basis. Once you do you will find that the causes of those daily hardships you face are much easier to deal with. You do not have to accept the status quo. It's your life and you can live it how you choose too. Your choices determine the outcome. If you want to live a healthier life, a less stressful life, a more fulfilling life, all you have to do is choose to do so. This may seem overly simplistic but it is very true. We spend far too much time searching for external causes to internal issues. We stubbornly hang on to states of mind and habits that, upon reflection, are of little or no benefit to us. Recognizing your ability to choose is a catalyst to making change.

In the year 2000 I set a long term goal for myself. I wanted to be in the best physical condition I could possibly be in on my fiftieth birthday. That day comes in 2010. I knew that this was doable over a ten year period. I did not know that it would be the roller coaster ride that it has been. I've fallen of the healthy lifestyle wagon more times than I can count. I've learned a lot about myself along the way and it's not over yet. The good news is I am now a non smoker, rather than a two pack a day smoker, and I am 75 pounds lighter than I was at my heaviest in 2001. The greatest benefit is that I am happier and live my life with much more ease than I have in many years. Getting healthy and staying healthy on the road is possible. It is your choice.