Sick Of It All

Sometimes it completely amazes me that more people don’t go postal. I think I’m just about there.

For a great deal of my life I haven’t been anything close to a good person. I’ve been a selfish motherfucker who did anything and everything I wanted to do no matter who I hurt. I sold drugs to kids and intentionally singled out the ones I knew were hurting the most in order to “ease their pain.” I held a gun in my hand and just about shot both my parents but was stopped due to circumstances beyond my control. I’m somewhat responsible (if even in my own mind) for the death of a friend. And so on and so forth.

Yet after a drug overdose that left me with permanent heart damage and 13 months of inpatient drug treatment (that was back in 1997) I decided to clean up. Not just my addiction and all, but every aspect of my life.

It hasn’t been easy. Shit, not even close. But I’ve spent 12 years trying to be a better man than I was before. Perhaps out of guilt from things I’ve done (which you only get to see a sliver), or perhaps because I got sick of doing things the way I was and still not being able to honestly smile at myself in the mirror. Or maybe a bit of both.

I really don’t know how much longer I can do this though. I’m about as completely spent as a person can be. I’m absolutely sick of trying any more.

I try to do everything the “way I should.” I’ve been a semi driver, working for the same company, for 7 ½ years. I always pay my taxes. Up until this year I had never once missed a credit card payment. I “bought” a house (meaning the bank actually owns it for the next 30-or-so years until the mortgage is paid off). I was putting money into my 401k.

I SO had it all together.

And then 2007 hit…

Not that it was all bad, because Allie moved in with me (yes, technically it was Christmas of 2006…but I consider that part of 2007). She’s an absolutely awesome girl that I love with everything in me. Most likely the only person I’d ever risk my life for too. But that was pretty much the highlight of the year.

I spent a bunch of money to start a stock and stock option trading business, which up until now has totally flopped (see previous entry) and is for the most part dead. I blew all of my savings trying in vain to pay off $60,000-some in credit card debt that finally got to be more than I could handle (partially due to a work fuck-up which made me work on a day I wasn’t supposed to and I missed a payment by a day, and so half of my minimum payments doubled). I filed for bankruptcy to get rid of that shit. My car died that very same week and I blew almost $500 I didn’t exactly have to fix it.

Seriously, I could go on and on but I’m really starting to feel like Hurley from the TV show Lost, who won the lottery and got cursed. Except I never won the lottery.

I feel completely trapped though.

Even with my finances being the shit that they are I still HAVE to pay almost a third of the money I earn for taxes and social security and medicare and shit like that. I hate (let me stress HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE!!!!!!!!!!) my job. And I have no way out.

Some would say, “Go get a different job.” And yet I can’t. I’ve never been to college and have no “skills” that I could prove to someone to be useful. I also have over $9,000 left to pay back into my 401k that I took out as a loan before which I might have to pay back as a lump sum if I change employers within the next five years (or so says my boss).

I was gonna put more here, but let’s just skip it.

I’m stressed. Really.

Like last fall on a rainy night up here in Minneapolis, I was driving my truck through downtown and some old fucker ran a red light (I had a green) and about hit me. I had to slam on my brakes (I was in my semi) and I started to slide into the oncoming traffic. I managed to get the thing under control, but I stopped next to the fucker at the next red light and hopped out of my truck, into the rain, with my big mag-lite in my hand (that’s a big flashlight if you don’t know). I walked around to the driver’s side window of that guy’s car and was seriously ready to break the window, pull him out, and beat the living fuck out of him.

Unfortunately we locked eyes for a second.

The look of absolute terror in his eyes, the way they said, “Please don’t hurt me! I’m just a worthless little fuck!” pierced me like nothing I’ve ever felt before. Then again, I’ve never really been that close to beating the living fuck out of someone.

But I walked back to my truck and drove off towards Chicago, rather amazed and ashamed at myself and how bad I was.

Which kinda brings us to the present.

You see, my employer has a tendency to require a bit more from us truckers than what we can actually LEGALLY do. This means that every time I go out on the road I risk my money (in the form of paying tickets) and my driving record in order to simply do my job.

About a month ago I decided that I had enough and that I was going to run legal. And I’ve been doing pretty good at that too until last night.

I had to deliver one single set of elevator doors after I had dropped off the majority of my load. One single stop that weighed less than 100 lbs.

I had a map that my dispatcher printed off of Microsoft Trips and Streets, but the guy at the previous stop said, “I know that area like the back of my hand. I lived there most of my life. I know exactly where that place is.” So he gave me directions.

Now for anyone who might know the Chicago area, I was in Carol Stream and had to drop off in Westchester.

I looked at the map I had and thought about the directions he gave me. It looked like it would be easiest to take I-290 to IL-12-20 and then take that to W. 22nd and then get on Enterprise (which is where I had to be). But the I-290/IL-12-20 interchange is rather fucky and streets that run north/south are actually labeled east/west and I got all turned around. So I decided to take the dude’s directions.

He said to take I-290 to York and go south and take that straight to 22nd (you can look it up on Mapquest if you want, just type in “Westchester, IL).

So I got back on 290 and went south on York. Less than a mile later it got all small and narrow and there were signs that said “No Trucks.” Yet there was nowhere that I could turn around.

I was kinda stuck between a rock and a hard place because I was on roads I knew I shouldn’t be on, and yet I couldn’t get off of.

Then I saw flashing lights behind me.

I knew I was gonna get a ticket. I knew it and so I grabbed the pepper spray I keep in my truck (mostly because sometimes I spend my nights in not-so-good areas of Chicago). Everything in me wanted to just shoot the guy in the face and beat him senseless.

Best case scenario- I leave and get away.

Worst case scenario- I end up getting shot and die.

I was kinda hoping for the second.

Yet I did nothing, like the pussy I am. I gave him my license and operation authority and told him how I got lost. His only reply was, “You need to get a good map and don’t rely on people to give you directions.”

Yeah, thanks asshole.

So now I have a ticket to pay and another thing on my driving record to make my insurance go up.

I really, really, REALLY am sick of all of this. It’s like no matter what I do or don’t do, I can’t get ahead. Even when I try to have a nice day with me and Allie (not gonna get into that) it goes to shit.

I don’t know how much more I can take before one of these times something happens and I snap.

I hate who I used to be, but sometimes you can’t hide from fate forever.

*
So break me down if it makes you feel right
And hate me now if it keeps you alright
You can break me down if it takes all your might
’cause I’m so much more than meets the eye.
*
Seether