Orientation

Orientation, in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, went like most orientations do. Long and drawn out. I finished tests and assignments first and thus spent a lot of time sitting around waiting for the next thing to start. My roommate was a pleasant jovial fellow from Hazleton, PA. He had worked local/regional for many years trucking into NYC with mattresses and delivering auto parts throughout the midatlantic. He would be working the Northeast regional accounts and get home every weekend. As with many he had come to Schneider in search of better pay and more consistency. It's easy to sit back as someone in my position, to think "the economy's tanking? I don't feel a thing. But as I return to the trucking industry the signs are everywhere. Smaller companies are shutting down, bigger companies are cutting corners. Schneider, known in the industry for providing full training to drivers with no experience or CDL is now hiring almost exclusively experienced drivers and I think, at this point, has almost completely discontinued its training program (temporarily, I hope. I think it is one of the best in the industry for those that can handle its manic pace.)

Recruiters had told us all that We might get a truck by thursday afternoon and have a load by friday. Thursday came and went and then friday and it became clear that there were not enough trucks for everyone. I think the reason is this: Schneider hires drivers at a rate that more or less matches the rate at which drivers quit. If enough drivers don't quit in a given week then there are not enough trucks and given the current (potentially psychological) recession drivers are probably less inclined to leave a steady job than they might otherwise be.
They sent us away for the weekend.
I headed to NYC since getting home via public transport is impossible and the train from harrisburg to nyc costs only $45.
I had a fine time in New York, perhaps for the first time since I was a little boy, perhaps because I spent the majority of the time in Brooklyn.
On monday, as I was dining with an old friend at his office in columbus circle I got a call that i had a truck.
later that evening I got back into Carlisle and moved into my truck. Its a little old, with 600k+ miles on it but it'll do.
The next day I readied the truck and then got my first load, a pick up, a rescue of sorts, near Scranton.