The roof of my truck, step van is broad and long. I park it partially under a tree, although not optimum for collecting sunlight for my solar system it is a gift from friends, parking under the tree.
The moisture is slight and the ground is barely wet, yet the moisture collects on the branches of the tree, the leaves and as it can no longer resist gravity, it drops on my truck roof with more volume than how it lands on the ground. My truck roof like a drum head and I am inside to hear the sounds being produced.
Moments, drip, drip drip. I did not think of this title to my blog on May 25, 2020, but back in 2008
I thought of the title sitting in the living room of my apartment and a faucet that might be dripping with this same kind of precipitation happening outside and I was sitting quietly enough to hear the dripping of the faucet. At least that is what I imagine and I am sticking to it, unless I have a moment of clarity back into that past.
As the water with the rhythm of nature continues to beat on my truck roof, I decide to light my little heater to dry out the moisture that has managed to accumulate inside where I am living. I have decided rather lately this morning, since it is already past 12 pm to move to the cab of my truck that has seats where none are yet present in the sleeping food prep area. I have adapted to living in the truck. For instance, instead of sitting in the drivers area and using the steering wheel as a desk with which to support my laptop computer as I did last night, I am sitting in the passenger area with my feet up on the heater cover and my knees bent at an angle and resting my laptop between my thighs and supported there. Makes for a fine touch typing position. Of course, it is now late afternoon or should I say closer to early evening. I have discovered while not working as a school bus operator I have energy in the evenings and I have been reclaiming that energy and using it. Not having to force myself to get up at 0 dark anything has been a boon for me, putting me back into my natural circadian rhythm.
When that flash of time happened when I worked on airplanes with me starting work at 2 pm and working until 10pm or so unless there was overtime was more relaxed for me and going to work was less of a chore than the last 13 years. I worked 4 10's and that gave me an RDO or Rotating days off. When I went to work at 2 pm I usually left at 1 pm and before that used to smoke ribs in the morning and my neighbors would ask me why I was up so early smoking things or why I wasn't at work. When they got to know me better, they understood and I would sometimes ask them if they might be interested in eating some ribs. Yummy!
A brief interlude into my short aviation career. It started in 1995 when I volunteered to come wipe oil off a plane I was flying on. I got to wipe oil and so much more. I worked on other airplanes and went to school to get my licenses. My career goal at the time was to work at UAL and when I got the job, that was an adventure like none I have ever had. I was excited in a way that I had only been on small points along in my life. That is a whole other chapter that I have to devote time to. Actually, when I worked at that job, my favorite job, it was rarely a chore. I loved every minute of it. Even when I first started and the first 6 months they had us newbies greasing everything on the airplanes. We would get so dirty and greasy that we would wear Tyvek suits to keep our regular work clothes cleaner.
But I need to get back to the present and operating a school bus is much more difficult than the general public including teachers and staff at schools or parents can possibly understand unless they have done it themselves and done it for at least one year. This is one of my main concerns for school bus operators is the perception of most people because school bus operators are so under estimated and that keeps them down and not wanting to make waves because many of them have this as their only skill and don't want to be discriminated against or retaliated against at their there jobs. they could be discriminated against I think it is called soft retaliation such as overlooking them from the seniority rotation, it was a mistake. Who's to say wasn't?
The job is already more difficult than can be imagined by many of you. Almost anyone can be taught to drive a school bus, but they can't teach you the skills needed to manage the students and operate the bus safely all the while protecting everyone on the inside and the outside of the bus. School bus drivers become operators as soon as they start transporting children. At that point they will will find out what is required. As an operator, I didn't get it right away; I am a slow learner. Much of what you do is try to stay out of trouble, stop at the required stops, pick up the kids and get them safely to school on time. All it takes is a late kiddo or a parent that wants to berate or praise or ask some question you don't have the answer for in the am or pm to be late for the next pick up or stop. It throws everything off, we are expected to be on time, but there are human factors that interfere. Human factors, they don't teach that in school bus operations as far as I recollect. I learned that in aviation human factors. Construction zones, flaggers, detours, collisions other drivers who fail to observe the school bus red lights and children in the area of the buses.
Just like the take off and landing of an airplane is the most dangerous part of a flight. So too, the picking up and dropping off of kids is the most dangerous part of our job, trying to keep them safe. Safety is the number one job and although I hear from other enterprises that safety is also their job, it is not reflected in the operators that they have because they are transporting packages and food, clothing, auto parts etc. Transporting human beings and vulnerable ones at that is much more of a demanding job. It has been compared to being in the active military, foot soldier on the front lines being totally and hyper-alert all the time you are on duty in the yellow bus!
Many of us too have come from different disciplines, college graduates, Masters degrees and technical fields, aircraft engineers and mechanics, mechanical engineers, school teachers, school bus operators from other areas who know more than some of the average operators. It is good to come from a mechanical back ground and if one is operating a school bus the desire to learn more should be there, to better oneself in that profession. As with any profession we work to make ourselves better, work smarter, be safer. It is a good asset to have operators who strive to be the best they can be, who don't have to work because they are sick and there is a nationwide shortage of school bus operators.
Retiring this years is a little difficult because I was not able to wish my groups of students well or have closure at the end of the year with5th and 8th graders who would be moving on to other schools and not being the senior class persons, but having having to start again at the bottom. Some of the same can be said for operators too. The last day of school and we gather at the dispatch office A new group of kindergartners and a new group of 6th graders.
I am adjusting the last couple of months to having an extended summer having been furloughed from my job in the middle of March. I had decided to retire this year after the school year was over the first week of June. I got a call the last week of May and dogged it because they asked if I was returning for the coming school year. It made it more real. I finally started calling back the following week, but I kept getting voicemail and was uncomfortable leaving one. I finally wrote an email to the guy that first hired me, who is still there. I told him I am retiring and that I also have a medical issue that I had to think about and it is hard to give up something that one has done much of their whole life, work that is. All of this puts more on my table than I thought of at first. It is just compounding, it is like putting a layer cake together, except you are taking it apart because you forgot to put the frosting in between the layers. When I think about taking responsibility for retiring and giving notice, I tear up because I have a lot of feelings around people I met, the change in my routine, going to a fixed expectations of the job and I don't do well in a non structured lifestyle. I am adjusting to my own chaotic rhythm and my unstructured lifestyle. I am readjusting to it. Also adjusting to the strangeness of living a truck. I try to be transparent, not like the other urban campers that don't have enough money or things and start moving onto the sidewalks. This is part of why I chose a truck and not an RV. I don't want to be associated with that group of folks.
I have reviewed this piece, edited and deleted, added more that I wanted to say, took away distractions that I had added and now, I will put it out there for you to read over.
