Dad's Truck

A chapter from my memoir... At least MY father cares enough to drive me to the top of the hill.

 “Your backpack weighs a ton!  Why don’t you clean it out before you go shopping?  Here, I’ll help you”, my husband says as he opens the medium sized compartment.

“Do you really think you’re going to need a snake bite kit at Machane Yehuda market or while shopping in Talpiot?” he laughs.

As I remove the snake bite kit, package of AA batteries, sun screen (it’s December), anti-bacterial hand cleaner, toilet paper (I already have tissues), and car cell phone charger (I don’t have a car), I remember how my dad taught me to always be prepared.  Dad got bored working inside the bakery; he really enjoyed and excelled at customer service, so when my brothers were old enough to do the baking Dad went out on the truck delivering bread to the stores and socializing with his customers. 

Because he put in long days driving hundreds of miles, he equipped the truck with a camp stove and cooler, small pot and utensils, paper plates and towels, and he used empty bread racks as a table.  He also had a fan that plugged into the cigar lighter (my Dad smoked cigars, not cigarettes) to keep him cool in the summer and a heater for the winter, lawn chairs, a large first aid kit, fire extinguisher and a porta-potty in the form of an empty JIFF Peanut Butter jar.  Oh, and there was also a pistol because he collected large amounts of cash from customers, and a shot gun in case he ran into a bear while relieving himself in a wooded area.

He kept a CB radio on so Mom could call and talk to him from the one he had mounted on the kitchen wall; my mother often had to yell into it to overpower the volume of the Merle Haggard tape in the 8-track player or the AM-FM radio.  It was fun to be able to listen to him over the then high-tech device; more than once we’d catch him singing along with Merle:

“We don't smoke marijuana in Muskogee
We don't take no trips on LSD
We don't burn no draft cards down on Main Street
 We like livin' right, and bein' free.

I'm proud to be an Okie from Muskogee
 A place where even squares can have a ball
We still wave Old Glory down at the courthouse
And white lightnin's still the biggest thrill of all”

 

One day my sister Lisa and I caught him singing along with Mac Davis:

“Oh Lord it’s hard to be humble, when you’re perfect in ev-er-y way.
I can’t wait to look in the mir-ror, cuz I get better lookin’ each day.
To know me is to love me, I must be a hell of a man.
Ooooh Lord it’s hard to be humble, but I’m doin’ the best that I can!”

We teased him mercilessly about that one. As he jumped down from the 22 foot-long aluminum van, we loudly sang the song with our best southern twang and laughed as we ran to help him with packages of goodies - Drake’s cakes and Lays potato chips - that he traded bread for with the other truck drivers.  He smiled with amusement and said, “Go ahead, bust my chops. You’ll get yours someday!”

And we did, or at least I did.  On frigid winter days I was happy that he agreed to disrupt his route and swing by the house to give me a ride to the bottom of the high school hill.  Lots of parents refused to drive their kids up that steep and often slippery hill, and I expected he would do the same.  Unfortunately for me, Dad had chains on his tires and that hill was a challenge to his manhood.  So he gunned it and ground the ice, proudly arriving in front of the main doors to the gigantic main lobby where all the big shots congregated in the morning.  I wanted to melt into the frozen slush and sneak into school unnoticed. I gave him a quick kiss on his grisly cheek and he waited.  He waited until I had passed behind the truck and was safely onto the sidewalk in full view of everyone.  And then he opened his window and while tooting his horn five times yelled:

“Hey, have a great day!”

I’m sure I heard him laughing as he drove off, a villainous type of laugh.  As the weather worsened, I got used to this embarrassing morning routine and struck back at anyone who attempted to make fun of me:

“At least MY father cares enough to drive me to the top of the hill.”

And you know what?  I made some new friends that winter who appreciated that ride to the top of the hill each morning holding onto the rubber straps that were attached to the bread racks and doing our best to balance with book bags on the slippery diamond plated floor. Looking back, I believe it was that experience that helped prepare me for my Egged bus rides.