It's about five o'clock, in that same dark parking lot I typed in last night. And it's snowing in November. Maybe I'm just too Southern--it don't seem right, somehow. At least it's not sticking.
***
It didn't stick. And I fled to the south with a trailer full of something. It's not much warmer down here, but it's a little drier.
Some of you may be wondering why I talk so vaguely about where I am and where I'm going. And what I'm carrying, and for whom. And who pays me to do it.
Well, I covered most of those questions a while back, briefly. What it comes down to is, the company doesn't like us talking too much about where we go and what we carry. Partly it's to preserve the customer's privacy. Partly, it's to protect the customer's product, and the truck, and us.
Hijackers do exist, it appears. And they tend to hit trucks they know are hauling something they want. So talking too much about cargoes and schedules is a good way to encourage the less-than-honest. And the company frowns very hard on any casual conversation about specific runs and specific customers.
***
And why do I call them "the company," you ask? And am I ashamed of my name, you wonder? Well, to understand the answer to those questions, you'd have to meet B. J.
I met B. J. shortly after I finished my training period and was assigned my own truck. He had no more experience that I did, but he did have a good bit more cynicism. We sat down and compared notes, and at some point I mentioned my idea for this blog.
"Did you look in your employee manual?" he said.
"For what? The number for their Censorship Department?"
"Think that's funny, do you?" He pulled a beat-up paperback out of his coat pocket, flipped through it, found a spot, and handed it across the table. "Take a look," he said. "And you might want to see if yours has something like it."
I smiled and shook my head as I took the book. Then I started reading and smiled a bit less. The page he'd found covered his company's policy on employees' personal web pages, and part of it read something like this:
...any derogatory remarks concerning the Company may be grounds for immediate termination. Truckbert Logistics reserves the right to decide whether a given remark is derogatory or not. Lack of action concerning any particular remark does not imply that said remark is NOT derogatory, or that said remark will not be judged derogatory at a later date. Truckbert Logistics may act on any statement concerning the Company at any time, and is the sole judge of whether a particular remark was appropriate...
"They're kidding," I said. I didn't sound too convincing.
"Nope. You want to write about what you do, fine. But you might want to check your six first. Even if your outfit don't have something like this in the fine print somewhere, that don't keep 'em from sticking it in later. Lawyers never take anything OUT."
"Point," I admitted. "But there are things about being a driver that you can't talk about if you can't mention your company at all."
"Yep," he said. "And if you think it's worth risking your job to tell folks about them, you go right ahead."
I stared at the table for a while. He sat back and crossed his arms and watched me. Eventually I looked up. "What about if I tell them what YOU said about those things? They can't fire me for what somebody else said about some other company."
"Right. So I get fired instead. Real clever."
"If nobody knows who you are, and nobody knows who you work for..."
He looked at me oddly for a second or two. Then he grinned. "Secret identity, huh? Do I get a Batmobile, too?"
"What, that puny thing? Your rig's bigger."
"Guess you're right. So what're you gonna call me?"
I gave it a little thought. "What about B. J.?" I said eventually.
He snorted a laugh. "I ain't got no monkey."
"You don't look old enough to remember that show."
"Flattery will get you nowhere."
***
Every once in a while B. J. calls me up. I nod and make sympathetic noises and take notes. He asks if I'm ever going to write about any of it, and I say I'm still getting up the nerve.
At least his name got on here, finally. Sort of.
(Oh, by the way, Truckbert Logistics isn't his company's name, either. Bet you never guessed.)
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