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| Our home for the night |
Driving home the other morning I met a
neighbour coming in the other direction and had to reverse 100 metres to a
gateway (which is as close to a passing place as you get on our lane). Now,
three years ago, after two years of being a cyclist and then migrating to a
rather lovely Audi 100 I may have been a bit perturbed at the need to reverse in
our rough lane complete with potholes, hidden drains and ditches, and long
grasses concealing loose rocks. Now though, with an environmentally friendly
(as much as you can be in a car) Citroen C3 Picasso I reverse like a trouper –
well like a seasoned truckie anyway. I waved sweetly at my neighbour, draped my
left arm nonchalantly over the passenger seat and, with my right hand somewhere
at six-thirty on the steering wheel I proceeded to back-up. Professionally.
With not a single falter or despairing glance around me. In seconds I was in
the space and receiving admiring words from said neighbour and his passenger.
Such professional reversing, complete with casual left-hand drape, reminded me
of the Saturday night in May 2001 which I spent in the back of a truck cab.
What
you have to know here is that I have a number of life-long dreams – things I’ve
dreamt of doing ever since childhood and sleeping in a truck is up there near
the top of the list along with seeing boiling mud (done), walking on a
salt lake (done) and living in a cave (still working on this). I first fell in
love with the idea of living in a truck when I was very small and became aware
of the fact that those trucks parked up over-night usually have some lucky
driver squirrelled away inside – no doubt reading a really exciting paper-back
by the dim glow of the in-cab lighting system. So in May 2001 I was thrilled
when we gate-crashed a cousin’s nephew’s Christening (actually I’m a little
worried here as I didn’t note in my diary whether it was a nephew or a niece –
if I’ve got it wrong I really did not mean to cause offence) and were given the
choice of squatting somewhere on the floor in the very grand house or spending
the night in the back of their truck. This wasn’t an ordinary British truck
either – this was a fabulous Australian road-train type of truck and I needed a
ladder just to get myself into the cab.
It
was all as exciting as I had imagined, clambering up into the cab then
squeezing between the seats into that new world – the secret world of the truck
driver. The lights were perhaps a little brighter than I had imagined and
obviously lighting a candle to add to the ambience would have been foolhardy
but nevertheless it was great. The walls were lined with that cushioned fabric –
the type that’s stitched up in diamonds – and alright, when I woke in the night
they were rather like the lining of a coffin (which did nothing for my insomnia
and actually reminded me of one of my childhood fears) but, whilst reading and
chatting prior to sleep they reminded you of a sumptuous Mongolian tent
(another childhood dream though I don’t fancy the yak-butter tea). Given that I
was sharing the cab with Rob it was especially cosy and you certainly wouldn’t
want to be sharing one of these with anyone other than your nearest and dearest
but if you’re the kind of child who originally wanted to be a snail someday
(until you grew a bit older and realised this particular wish wouldn’t come
true) then I can certainly recommend a night or two in a cab.
Now,
cooking in a cab is probably not to be recommended – so, on that note I’ll sign
off and leave my recipes for tomorrow.
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