Everything around you came by truck!
In this day of the cyber world, it is hard to image that things are still handled by human hands every day. You Amazon prime people (for example), who get your stuff quick and at a minimal charge for shipping. Those things which you ordered were first, sorted, then boxed, then shipped by Semis across the country to the UPS or FEDX terminals, then to you, in record time! It makes me tired just to write about it! Our plentiful grocery stores, convenience stores, retail merchants, and the list goes on, was brought, (many things from the ports), to massive warehouses, then to distribution centre’s, then to your local store, for your convenience. Non stop 24 hour 7 days a week, driving 300 million miles over the roads, in less than favourable conditions, and yet we have little respect or tolerance for the semis on the road. Do you realize there is a huge shortage in truck drivers today? In an industry of 800,000, there are only 48,000 truck drivers. Their pay is minimal because any raise they get is passed on to the consumers. And you know how we get when the prices of things go up! Do you know most of the company trucks today have governors on the engines, and cannot do over 65 mph? How many times have you cut a semi driver off because you are in a hurry? Do you really think he can stop the 75,000 pounds he is carrying on a dime? Over 745 drivers were killed at their jobs last year, many sacrificing themselves so no one else would get hurt, from a thoughtless person cutting them off in traffic.
I bring this up because black Friday is on the horizon and the demands of products are increasing. Many of these truck drives live in a 6X10 sleeper bunk and see their families once or twice a month for a day maybe two. They are over worked and lonely, so GIVE THEM A BREAK! And I don’t mean stop short in front of them. Be patient on the road, and understand they are just doing their job. And their job is bringing you stuff, all the stuff you little heart desires!
As parents we need to teach our children where the stuff they want and eat comes from. How it got there, and therefore to treat it well. And to respect the hard-working men and women who make their lives comfortable and safe, like the garbage men. There is no small menial jobs, only small people, a good lesson to teach.
We as writers don’t seem to make heroes from the truck drivers, and garbage men and women in the world. Is that because there isn’t enough glamor in the jobs they do? Maybe it is up to us to give them their due!
Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart, as unto Christ;
Not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart;
Ephesians 6:5-6
For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat.
II Thessalonians 3:10
For the scripture saith, thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn. And, The labourer is worthy of his reward
I Timothy 5:18
And that ye study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you;
I Thessalonian 4:11
The sleep of a labouring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much:
Ecclesiastes 5:12a