A Trucker in my Toolkit

I went to have a meeting with a client this week that involved a solitary 5 ½ hour car ride, each way, there and back (Jim decided not to be my chauffeur this time and stay home with Susie Q – the love of his life, having replaced me ;-). Two hours of the stretch of highway coming home was two lanes, in the darkness on winding north country roads, with trucks coming at me every ten seconds in the opposite lane like bats out of hell. My inclination was to boot it out of there, but my saner self said to take it slower and make it home alive.

The solution: stay behind a ten-wheeler (but don’t try this on the 401 where trucks seem to lose all their social skills). You may be going slower but life in a slower lane may be safer:

• The truck ahead has bigger lights than you so you can see what is ahead better than if you go it alone.
• If a moose runs out into the road, he/she is going to run out and hit the truck. not you; the truck would survive if hit. In any event, better the truck sacrificed than you.
• The truck driver, sitting higher up in a seat than you in a car, can see dangers on the road before you do. Follow his/her lead.
• Trucks coming in the opposite direction will make space for something as big as they are. They will hug the centre line if approaching a car; they won’t if they are facing something as big as they are.
• The truck will slow down when approaching a curve where you might not have. You are forced to slow down and take the curve with the truck.
• Trucks will move into the right lane when the highway opens to allow a passing lane. They respect the fact that you might want to pass. If you don’t pass, they respect that too.
  

A big shout out to the Thibodeau driver who was on highway 11 between New Liskeard and North Bay yesterday between 5 and 6 p.m. Thanks for being my guide.

As I drove yesterday, I was reminded of driving home in a blinding rain storm from my sister’s cottage. I was picking up my niece for a special visit. Mom had died recently and I missed her desperately. My mom would have been beaming with pleasure that my niece and I were connecting over a visit. The road I was travelling on (same highway as yesterday, in fact) was treacherous and I was white-knuckle terrified. Should I carry on, or should I go back? If I go back, I’ll disappoint my niece. Can I find the courage to go forward, though? I couldn’t even see out the windows and the windshield wipers were all but useless. I knew, though, that at various points on the side of the road, there was no barrier and my car – if I made a wrong move, would topple into darkness. Maybe I should go back? What price to disappoint my niece?

Not only that, the dome light in my car is on and I can’t turn it off. It is not helping and, indeed, it is making it worse – I’m having trouble making out the shadows of the road because my car inside is lit up and it’s casting weird shadows that just aren’t there. I’m pushing all kinds of buttons in the car trying to figure out how to turn off this nightmare light.

Just at my lowest point, two trucks arrive out of the driving rain. One is in front of me; one is in back of me. They deliver me safely to the point where highway 11 meets highway 400 and I can finally see again. And, weird of all weird, just then the dome light goes off all on its own.

I know as sure as I am sitting here writing this that my Mom was watching over me that day and helping me on my journey, as she always did. I believe. She heaven-delivered those trucks to me that many years ago and she dispatched Mr. Thibodeau Truck to me yesterday.

It is indeed strange how the lessons of the past help us to travel in the future. I would not have known that the best idea would be to follow the truck yesterday had I not had the awful experience a number of years ago. We just have to look for the patterns in our life and figure out that what made us successful in the past will help us weave the treacherous paths of our future.

There is an exercise that I recommend to people who are going through a stressful change. Plot your life on a line graph, showing the highs and lows of your life (marriage, child, death, losing a job, bankruptcy, your spouse having an affair, getting the job of your dreams, whatever). For each point on the graph, list what skills and strengths you possessed, or the tools you used, to get you through the event. Use those very same strengths and skills to get through the change you are currently going through. You will find that each time you go through a stressful event, you add one more tool to your kit to help you face the next one.

My toolkit involves truckers! What does yours include?