GOING TO WORK
Mrs. C and I
just returned from helping her son and DIL move from North Jersey to Amish
country in Pennsylvania. The move was a
little over 250 miles to a very nice new two-bedroom apartment.
While the
kids drove out ahead to sign papers, check in and do whatever you have to do when
moving into a new home, Mrs. C led the way for Cranky to drive a van of the
kids possessions.
Sounded easy
enough when I volunteered driving duty, until I saw the truck.
How two kids could accumulate so much stuff that had to follow them I have no idea. The Truck that was packed to the hilt was a 26-foot U-Haul van. Not an eighteen-wheeler, but for an old man, it was a big honking truck.
Driving this
thing about scared the stuffings out of me.
A big full truck does not accelerate very fast. It does not slow down very fast. When you veer just a bit while answering Mrs.
C on the cell phone, it does not recover quickly. I may have hit those wake-up strips on the
highway more than a few times, and I rode them for several seconds when I did.
At one point
Mrs. C called and asked,
“Is the
truck pulling to the right?”
This was her
polite way of asking,
“Do you
know what the Hell you’re doing, or are you falling asleep?”
I assured
her the only thing wrong with the steering was the driver.
Anyway, I certainly
gained new appreciation for the men and women who keep our economy running by
handling those really, big trucks, part of the lifeblood of our economy.
When we did
reach our destination, we now needed to unload this monstrosity. I’m a little surprised it all fit into their
new apartment. Clearly, they will be doing
some crap culling over the next few weeks.
Anyway, it
took the four of us three hours of hauling boxes of books, furniture and stuff. It then took another few hours for Mrs. C to assemble
shelves and storage systems that were new in the box. I served as Mrs. C’s gofer and resident screwer
and hammerer.
I won’t even
go into the fiasco of trying to return the big truck. Suffice to say it was not without incident,
and when we finally dropped it off it was like taking a boulder off my chest.
Anyway, the
kids are moved into a lovely apartment in a very pretty section of our
country. I expect they will be very
happy as their previous situation was not particularly pleasant.
I did learn
that if I choose to come out of retirement, truck driving is out of the
question. Manual labor is out of the
question. Actually, standing for over three hours is out of the question.
Do Wal-Mart
greeters get to sit down while they wave to customers?
This adventure is over now, and I plan on a hot bath followed by rolling around in a vat of “Hempvana“
before taking a long nap!
10 4 good
buddies!
