Low Sulfur Diesel

by Father Luke

[What would've been written had Whitman drove big rigs. - Eds.]



“Well, now you know what truck drivers go through. . .”
--Letter from Victor M. Farr, death row inmate - circa 2006


I heard it over the CB Radio:
“Have you ever seen a driver so fat that the back of his head looked like a package of hot dogs?”

I looked at my partner.

The back of his neck looked like a package of hot dogs. He was fat. He was very fat. Oh, he was skinny by Truck Driver standards. And the dough dick was ignorant. He could barely put a sentence together. He pointed and grunted when a simple “Hi," or a smile and a wave would work in any civilized society. He was dumb, fat and awful smelling. It had been nearly a week since he had showered. He smelled only the way that fat men may smell after not having showered for a week.

I looked away from him and to the white lines in the middle of the road. The small lines passed under the truck, and I hallucinated that I was unzipping the American Country side, and that it stank. It stank horribly. Its rank odor was bad, Honcho. Sour, dead meat bad; road kill rotting in the sun bad. I dreamt that America had rotted from the inside out.

The land of plenty: Johnny Cash, prostitutes, and jumbo refills.

Why would I endure being cooped up with a man who refused to bathe? And then, cooped up in a space smaller than a jail cell? Money, that’s why Chief; the Greenback dollar. The promise of money makes an unshowered fat man’s smell the sweet smell of success. Filthy lucre; the American Dream, pal, that’s what it is. Every whiff of his duck butter was another day paid on the rent. America; My Country ‘tis of Thee; Sweet land of Misery, it’s of thee I sing, over the Johnny Cash tune on the outlaw radio.

I am a forty nine year old man. There is a United States Government record of my entire earnings since age 16. Come here. I’ll tell you the amount. It’s less than 170,000 for my entire life. Let’s add that up, shall we?

49 – 16 = 33

49 years of living, minus the age I started having a record kept for me of my earnings by my dear old Uncle Sam. Thirty three years, Buster. Thirty three years of my life adds up to 170,000. Let’s take that one step further.

170,000 divided by 33 = 5151.51

What are those numbers? What gibberish am I spilling now? It’s simple, Simon, and I’ll explain it to you.

For thirty three years of my life, I have lived on approximately 5151.00 per year. Oh, I could throw in the extra .51, but why quibble?

One more step and we’ll move on. I promise.

5151.51 divided by 365 = 14.11

Still with me?

For thirty three years I have lived on 14.11 per day.

I have a website, Father Luke dot Com, and I have an “About me” section where I brag a little bit about who I am. I brazenly state that I’m a man who has been homeless, off and on, for 27 years. I have been a Priest, I have been a Court Trained Mediator, I have been trained by the state of California to drive 18 Wheel trucks. I have been trained to do these things. In the land of opportunity, and justice for all, I am a man who has made $5000 per year for 33 years. I consider myself a lucky man; a happy man, the type of man who’s happiness only the desperate may experience; a happy idiot. And why the hell not, I ask you? Why the hell not. . .

A swell couple’s company I was working for earlier this year went bankrupt. Their small family business had been purchased for 580,000. If my calculations are correct, it would take me 113 years to be able to purchase that company at my current rate of employment.


I looked out at the American Countryside, with the stinking ignorant beast beside me; an animal, too stupid to care. I looked at the land which so many call their home. We stopped at a roadside stand, and he filled up his jumbo jug with a sugary, caffeinated drink.

As I waited outside, fueling up the truck, a woman with no teeth walked up to me and asked if I wanted to buy some cologne for 25.00. She was offering me oral sex. I put my hand on the side of the truck and I wept. I cried for me. I cried for Americans everywhere who believe in a dream . . .

Everywhere for fifteen minutes at a time - - - cooking the books - - - .22 per hour

Drivers are held to strict Government standards. 14 hour shifts. No more than 11 hours permitted within those 14 hours for driving. The trucking industry is big money, man; BIG money. It’s the kind of money that can make people disappear. Comprendo? If you drive a truck, Federal law says that operating expenses will earn you 52.00 per day as a tax write off. That is immediately. This is your per diem.

Let’s say you own your own truck. You are making 1.50 per mile to take a load of shoes from one end of the country to the other. A long run of 4000 miles at 1.50 would bring you 6000.00 before expenses. There is no state in the union with a speed limit of more than 75 miles per hour. On average, a truck driver will find himself traveling at about 65 miles per hour. Got your math hat on?

4000 (miles) divided by 65 (miles per hour) = 61 hours

61 (hours) divided by 11(legal hours to drive in a shift, i.e. 14 hour stretch of time) = 5 shifts

5 shifts x 52.00(per deim) = 260 and that means tack on another 260.00 to your profits, because the Federal Government says: “Hey? Take 52.00 per day, and use it how you like. It’s on us, Bud.”

6026.00 for five days work. 6026.00 to drive a truck from here to there in five days. Hell, your per diem is 18,980.00 if you were to work 365 days a year. You won’t work 365 days per year, so take off 52.00 for every day you don’t - - nice bonus from your Uncle Sam.

It doesn’t take a genius to realize that there is good money in being stupid.

Now here is the twist which will make you sick.

Go to work for a company that has a fleet of trucks in every state of the Union. Each week, big trucking companies hire on hundreds of workers who are looking to make that kind of money in their life through good, honest, decent hard work. Men and women who grew up with a work ethic that says:


• Get up
• Make your bed
• Go to Work

Go out and begin employment with a trucking company that has a large fleet of trucks. You will be paid approximately 61.00 per day to drive anywhere from 500 to 700 miles each day.

You will do this for approximately 30 days.
Do you still have your math hat handy?
Okay. Put it on . . .

61.00 (per day) x 30(days) = 1830.00

No per diem is allowed, as the company “Takes care of that for you." In essence, the company has you hauling freight for them for free.

Oh. I could say that you are paying the company to work for them, but that would be ungrateful, wouldn’t it?

The sad truth is that you are being paid the per diem you are rightly owed, as full salary.

The man I am driving with is leasing the truck we drive. He pays 1200.00 per week for the privilege of using the company’s truck. It’s no wonder that the poor goon doesn’t ever stop to take a shower, he’s bat shit crazy with worry that he won’t be able to make his truck payment.

He drives till I have to push him awake. “I’ll drive for you,” I say. And he curls up in back and snores like a wino farting in a rescue mission.

I have already driven 14 hours today. Well, so has he. What’s few more hours, I reckon, so that my friend might rest his worried head? He has children he needs to feed, I only have rent.

I look at the country side. I’m everywhere in America for fifteen minutes at a time. I see beauty, and I peacefully go on the nod behind the wheel.


Once back at the hotel the Trucking Company owns, I fall asleep on a box spring covered with a sheet. It’s supposed to pass for a bed in the room I have been assigned during training. I wake in the morning. I have a roommate. He is missing a big toe on his left foot.

“What happened to the toe,” I say to him by way of good morning.
“Still have it,” he says. And he holds up his right hand. The toe is a thumb.

I look around the room for a coffee maker.

“I have been waiting for 14 days to get assigned to a truck,” he says.
“Well, you aren’t getting paid for that,” I said.
“I know,” the man says to me. “I’ve added it up. I have been here for a total of fifty days. The total of my income divided by my time here amounts to about .22 per hour. I’m getting sick of this.”

There is no coffee maker in the room. I look at the man with a toe for a thumb. I ask him about his bed.

“It was a sheet over a box spring,” the man said.

Home

The man with a toe for a thumb and I phoned the bus station, and we each bought a bus ticket. After 40 days on the road, I am going home. I have less money now than when I began.

The bus driver is an angry man; he yells over the speakers in the dark as we approach small towns. Babies wake, and they begin crying. Old people cough. Adults and children look out dark windows which reflect back to them the sad and angry faces which are inside. I’ll ride the bus for four days.

America: The land of opportunity. America: Love her or leave her. America: of thee I sing.