Reflection Upon My Journey

Well....some..actually alot of you know the difficulty I have had with backing a trailer and obtaining my license. I won't lie when I tell you , that I was more than a bit jealous of some of the peeps in my class who got it the first time. The guys who had experience , the good ole boys and the just plain lucky.

I don't know if this is taking the high road when I share this , but I just got a text from one of those who passed the CDL his first go round, telling me his current company sucks and he is looking for a new job. I was like...you just got your license and what? I can't handle delivering food for this company (which will remain nameless). I told him job hopping dosen't look good for any industry, i should know I helped my call center manager screen applicants, one thing we always drew our eye to was the number of jobs one had , why they left and what happened etc.

I told him to reconsider, i dunno what he will do. He is doing one of those food delivery gigs for his first CDL job...not what I want to do personally with a bad back myself.

Anyway I guess I just wanted to share the irony of things. The one who passed first go round is having a hard, i guess a real hard time at his new gig. I hope I can be different. I really want to last in this . I have put all my financial chips and spirit on the table for this....

I'll keep the forum posted, I leave on Tuesday to be with mom and the lung biopsy. As such I may not be on much this weekend at all. In addition to packing and pre trip house cleaning, my garbage disposal unit decided to take a crap on me and I have to replace it before I leave. ALWAYS BEFORE I HAVE TO TAKE A FLIGHT, NEVER FAILS. LOL , I am just learning to laugh at things at this point...no sense in getting worked up.

(I have a work on the property for cheaper rent deal with my landlord, he will buy parts and material etc and I install/replace - last winter it was the water heater.....)

I love the new positive direction and encouraging stories and comments I am seeing , gives me hope. I am doing better , Thank you Brett for the Tony Roberts suggestion, I have listened to a couple of his pod casts , got me thinking and moving to action this week.

Alright I have packing to do and a disposal to replace....later

Later

Moe

Those food delivery gigs are definitely tough, it takes a special kind of person to do those long term. At first I loved doing it but ended up getting burned out and grew frustrated (which is quite clear in the diary I made). I stuck it out a year and a half, which made me a better candidate for my "perfect" (for me) job I have now due to all the close quarter maneuvering. Unfortunately your classmate likely heard about the money those guys make and figured it cant be too hard and had a rude awakening.

Your post is a great example of what we often talk about here. Passing your CDL test on the first shot, or being top of the class is a great achievement and something to be proud of but it doesnt mean you'll be successful on the road. Likewise, someone who struggles through school and takes multiple attempts to pass can go on to be a very successful driver. Kearsey failed her test multiple times and has gone on to be one of the most successful drivers we have here, and exactly the kind of driver we need more of.

Hopefully everything works out for you and your mom Moe. I'm sending my thoughts and prayers.

I’m really good at procedures. U tell me exactly how to do something and I can do it. I passed my test first time. Did not miss a point on backing, but that didn’t mean a donkey’s butt in the real world. I could not back, was horrified to back! I was to the point I won’t go solo! But I did, I still struggle with backing, but so what? I’ve seen better backers than me, I’ve seen some worst, but I haven’t seen a perfect backer yet!

What turned me off to the food delivery gigs right off the bat was the physical side of things (my back is bad so i cant do a ton of lifting) now admittedly his company uses lifts and pallet jacks not hand trucks , so the physical side probably would not have been an issue for me. What would have been an issue is navigating the city traffic as a new CDL driver , trying to meet the demanding schedule while on the drive clock , while being the face of the company (let me be real, it can be really hard to have the customer empathy when you have or are having a bad day, behind schedule or what not etc) ANNNNDDD lets not even discuss backing of the trailer into really odd and awkward spaces around full parking lots full of really value inflated cars - hey I drive a 17 year old pick up, some of these new cars and what people willingly pay for them , lets just say I shake my head at that mess.

Now the pay was great - $24.50 right out of school and then brought up to union wage of $28 per hour, the money sounds great! Until you add up the long hours, the frustrating city traffic, the face to face mess , ANNNNNDDD the backing of the trailer and pretty soon you start to feel like its not a good deal. The food industry is churn and burn man, from delivery , cooking, servers, hosts and dishwashers.

I go into my favorite restaurants and rarely see the same people working from week to week, I will use that experience and assume its the same for the delivery side of things, admittedly never having worked it.

Just my logical guess

Those food delivery gigs are definitely tough, it takes a special kind of person to do those long term. At first I loved doing it but ended up getting burned out and grew frustrated (which is quite clear in the diary I made). I stuck it out a year and a half, which made me a better candidate for my "perfect" (for me) job I have now due to all the close quarter maneuvering. Unfortunately your classmate likely heard about the money those guys make and figured it cant be too hard and had a rude awakening.

Your post is a great example of what we often talk about here. Passing your CDL test on the first shot, or being top of the class is a great achievement and something to be proud of but it doesnt mean you'll be successful on the road. Likewise, someone who struggles through school and takes multiple attempts to pass can go on to be a very successful driver. Kearsey failed her test multiple times and has gone on to be one of the most successful drivers we have here, and exactly the kind of driver we need more of.

Hopefully everything works out for you and your mom Moe. I'm sending my thoughts and prayers.

Yea that was this guys thing, he mentioned to me about the places he was having to back in and out of. As I already knew. Backing around a set of cones in a controlled environment is no marker for how one will do in the real world

I’m really good at procedures. U tell me exactly how to do something and I can do it. I passed my test first time. Did not miss a point on backing, but that didn’t mean a donkey’s butt in the real world. I could not back, was horrified to back! I was to the point I won’t go solo! But I did, I still struggle with backing, but so what? I’ve seen better backers than me, I’ve seen some worst, but I haven’t seen a perfect backer yet!

Moe,

What do they call the guy who finishes last in medical school?

Doctor!

What do they call the guy who just barely passes his CDL exam?

Driver!

When I was considering getting into driving as a new career, I was convinced that I wanted to start in flatbed. I had a romanticized idea about flatbedding. Well, after my first Winter driving Dry Van and seeing what flatbedders deal with in the freezing cold, I can admit that I would have made a huge mistake if I had followed through on the idea. Same with local delivering of food, etc., on frequent stops throughout a work day. Just give me my runs of no-touch cardboard freight daily and I'll be happy.

That's not a Doctor I would be wanting to go to for treatment.

Moe,

What do they call the guy who finishes last in medical school?

Doctor!