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Sometimes, I think that my dreams mock me.
I'm sitting in a deserted parking lot at one of my company's trucking terminals as I write this. Well, not quite deserted. Another trucker just pulled up a few minutes ago. But I don't know if he'll be staying or if he's just dropping off a trailer. No staff will be at the terminal until tomorrow night which is when I make my first delivery under this load. There is a truck stop a few miles down the road, but it costs $10 for 12 hours of parking. So, here I will sit and feel alone and haunted. Nobody on the planet knows exactly where I am right now, not even the trucker who just pulled in. I'm situated in here in a way that I'm pretty sure he didn't see me.
I'm sitting next to a small pond and the little kid part of me that was afraid of the dark keeps expecting some monster to rise up out of it and come after me and my truck. But the adult me is haunted by real demons, although they are in my mind. This is something that I had sort of expected to happen, but not to this degree. I knew that if I were to spend any length of time out on the road that I would likely run into road blocks in my mind. I think most truckers experience it at some point, that is, if they have demons in the first place. It's due to being alone a lot. When it's just me and the road and no other distractions or people to keep the demons at bay, they come for me.
But this time is different. It used to be that the demons would get the better of me. I didn't seem to be much of a match for them. But I'm digging down deep this time and holding my own. They are still ripping open old wounds, but I'm quick to cauterize them and then stick that hot iron right in the little fucker's eye who caused the pain in the first place. I think I'm starting to win the battles.
I started driving long haul again in July of this year after about 10 years of driving locally. So far it has been more therapeutic than the total of all of my sessions combined with psychologists. I'm learning how to fight what is wrong and I needed to get out of my hometown and away from the people I know to do it. This journey into self employment and out on the road is more than just and adventure out into the world. It's just as much a journey into my interior world, and perhaps that journey is even more important.
So, here I will sit and be haunted. But maybe tonight my dreams will not mock me.
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