New York Times Paints Portrait of Truckers’ Lives on the Road
Screen shot of New York Times website
” >
Screen shot of New York Times website
” width=”350″>
A few weeks ago, the New York Times ran a piece about the lives of truck drivers that didn’t do much to help raise the profile of truck driving as a potential career, but it and a follow-up piece did paint a colorful portrait of the lives of truckers.
In “Alone on the Open Road: Truckers Feel Like ‘Throwaway People,” Times reporters visited a Petro truck stop in Effingham, Illinois, and interviewed truckers they found there.
“At a moment when President Trump has ignited a national discussion of blue-collar labor and even climbed into a truck during a White House event, trucking, which was once among the best-paying such jobs, has become low-wage, grinding, unhealthy work,” wrote reporter Trip Gabriel.
“We’re just like cops. Everybody needs us, but nobody wants us,” said Greg Simmons, 54, Hastings, Florida, a driver for 27 years. He was also the source of the “throwaway people” line.
“You forget how to communicate with people,” said Ayisha Gomez, 39, Riverside County, California, a driver for three years. She’s only doing this long enough to pay off her daughter’s college loans.
“Any one of my grandkids do it, I’ll kill ’em,” said Ron Carrabis, 70, Las Vegas, who’s been driving 30 years for the same company.
Yet it wasn’t all bad.
“Every day, you wake up somewhere different,” said Susan Zimmerman, 48, Danville, Virginia, who’s been driving two years. “You have sunrises and sunsets. Yeah, it’s the same sun, but it’s different everywhere — the colors, the textures.”
Michael Gallant, 22, of Biddeford, Maine, who’s been driving for eight months, told the times, “Truck driving is something I’ve always wanted to do since I was a little kid. I love it. There are some times when it’s kind of a crappy job, but other times it’s …Read the rest of this story
