There are over a million miles of highway criss-crossing this great country. At any given moment of most any hour of the day there is probably an 18-wheeler on just about every mile. And there are just about the same number of them parked at rest areas or truck stops. I drove one of those big shiny rigs over the road for more than three years. That doesn’t make me an old veteran at it, but it does give me a lot of insight concerning what goes on out there on the big road.

If you’ve never been behind the wheel of a big rig then it’s pretty hard to imagine just how tough a job it really is. You sit up there in that seat and bounce along for ten hours at a time. At least that’s what your logbook says. I’ve put in my share of twenty- hour days behind the wheel, and if the rough ride doesn’t get you the boredom will. That is why truckers sort of look forward to something, anything, out of the ordinary happening. It may scare you to death, but it will relieve the boredom.

One day I picked up a load of roofing shingles in southern Arkansas and headed to Los Angeles with them. Since I had gotten a late start I got to Dallas rather late. By the time I got through Fort Worth I was looking for a place to shut down for the night. There is a big rest area just west of Fort Worth and I pulled in and shut her down for the night. The next morning I woke up bright and early and after a quick visit to the facilities I put Baby Doll in gear and headed for the on-ramp. I was running through the gears as I approached the interstate. I looked in my mirror and saw a truck moving over to the left lane leaving the right lane open for me. No surprise there, all truck drivers do that as a professional courtesy. What I was not expecting was the sweet feminine voice that came across the CB radio.

"Come on out of there, flatbed," she said. "Let’s get on down t he road."

The on-ramp was on a bit of a downgrade so by the time I made it onto the interstate I was already in seventh gear. I was going almost as fast as she was by the time I got out fully into the right lane and she moved slowly past me. She was driving a conventional International and pulling a refrigerated trailer. I reached for the mike of my CB.

"Thank you little lady in the reefer," I said. "Who we got there?"

"They call me Frog," she answered. "Where you headed?"

"I’m headed out to Shakytown," I said. "How about you?"

"Me too," she said. "Come on, let’s get out there. What do they call you?"

"They call me Midnight Cowboy. What have you got on?"

"I’ve got a load of tomatoes from Florida headin’ out to LA."

"Well, put the hammer down on that thing and let’s get moving."

"I’m doing all this thing will do," she said. The governor on this thing kicks in at just above 55."

One of the first things you learn when you drive a truck is that having someone to talk to is a wonderful thing. No matter who it is. I can’t count the number of times that I hooked up with someone that happened to be going the same way that I was and just rode along talking about whatever may come up. It makes time go by faster and helps alleviate so much of the boredom. Most of the guys that I’ve run across the country with I never actually set eyes on. It was just a guy in a truck rolling down the highway with me. Normally I cruised along around ten miles an hour over the speed limit. On the interstate, that’s not too bad. It’s fast enough to get you where you’re going but not so fast that it’s dangerous. Plus, you have your CB turned on so that if there is a state trouper somewhere ahead of you, you know about it in plenty of time to slow down. I think I mentioned earlier that I’d only been awake a few minutes when Frog and I crossed paths so I decided I’d take it easy for a while and run with her. Since Frog keeping up with me was more of a problem than me keeping up with her I let her take the front door and I tucked in behind her about a quarter of a mile back.

So began a long trek across west Texas. Frog in the front and me trailing along behind. We had no trouble finding things to talk about as we went on our way. We spent all day rolling along I 20 together. As we were rolling along Frog mentioned that she had some friends that lived near a truck stop in New Mexico. At the pace we were keeping we should get there just about in time to shut down for the night. Now before you go reading more into that than there actually was let me say this, one of the reasons that Frog and I were getting along so well is the fact that I’m a happily married man so I wasn’t spending most of my time trying to get her to spend the night in my sleeper with me. Not that there was anything wrong with the way she looked either. We had stopped for lunch together and a couple of rest stop breaks along the way so I knew that she was a rather attractive woman. I’m just not enough of an egomaniac to get the idea that since Frog was a woman driving a truck that she would just naturally have the hots for me.

Somewhere along the way we stopped for a short rest and she called ahead to tell her friends that we were on our way and she told me that we had both been invited to have dinner with them. It’s an old adage that truckers know all the good places to eat so if there are trucks in the parking lot the restaurant must be pretty good. Nothing could be further from the truth. Truck drivers stop at a restaurant because of where it is. If it is easy to get off and back on the interstate and the parking lot is set up so that it’s easy to park your rig then that’s a good place to stop and eat. It has no bearing on the quality of the food there. That’s not saying that the food in all truck stops is bad. Some truck stops have very good food. Sweet Pea’s Truck Stop in eastern Arkansas comes to mind but that’s another story that I may tell you some other time. By and large, however, the food in most truck stops is not all that great, so a chance to eat a home-cooked meal is not something that any trucker in his right mind will turn down.

Of course nothing is free. It turned out that Frog was a pretty proficient air conditioner mechanic. Her friends in New Mexico owned a repair shop next door to the truck stop and her friend had a car with an a/c problem that needed Frog’s attention. Of course I agreed to help her work on it so I wouldn’t feel guilty about getting a free steak dinner. Frog made short work of getting that air conditioner to blowing air cold enough to freeze you out of the car and her friend took us to his house for our reward. I don’t think I’ve ever had a steak that was done to the level of perfection that I had that evening. After dinner Frog and I sat out in her friend’s back yard and watched the sun set over the New Mexico desert. By the time her friend took us back to our trucks at the truck stop Frog and I had formed a fast friendship.

I woke up bright and early the next morning and went and knocked on the door of Frog’s truck. She was just waking up herself and said she’d meet me in the restaurant for a quick breakfast before we headed out again. We spent the rest of that day rolling across the high plains then laid up for the night somewhere in Arizona.

There are hills in various parts of this country that scare a truck driver to death. No matter how old a veteran driver he or she is you can almost see them shudder when you mention names like Black Mountain in North Carolina or some of the big ones in California like Grapevine, Tehachapi and Donner Pass. Going up those hills is a study in patience. You just keep going down to a lower gear until you find one that will pull you up it. That is why trucks seem to be going so slow on a long up grade, they are going slow. The engine getting you to the top is one thing, the brakes getting you down is something else all together. Trying to nurse eighty thousand pounds down the side of a mountain is no easy feat. You have to drop your speed so that you can shift to a lower gear on the way down. That way the engine can help to brake you a little. The reason that you have to be so careful is that brakes work on friction. Too much friction and your brakes overheat and burn out on you. That is what those runaway truck ramps are for, just in case some idiot burns out his brakes on the way down.

While we are on the subject of truck brakes, most people know that a truck’s brakes work on air pressure. There is an air compressor attached to the engine of a big rig that keeps the air pressure up in an air tank. When you hit the brakes that pressurized air goes to the brakes and slows the truck down. Of course if the air pressure gets too low then the brakes won’t work. There is a gauge on the truck’s instrument panel that keeps you up to date on how much air pressure you have. There is also a warning light and buzzer that alerts you if the air pressure starts to get low. A truck is also equipped with a set of spring brakes that work just the opposite of your service brakes. When there is no air pressure the springs lock the brakes. That way, once the air pressure leaks off while the truck is parked and the engine isn’t running the truck stays parked where it is.

I hope you caught all of that because it is going to be very important later.

Frog and I pulled out of the truck stop in Arizona and made our way west. By noon we were in eastern California at a place called Desert Center. Desert Center is, well, right in the middle of the desert, but more importantly it’s right at the end of the high plains. From there the road begins a long, fairly straight drop down to the lowland desert. There is a truck stop there and we pulled in to grab a quick lunch. That truck stop is a good place to stop because it gives you some time to gather your wits about you. Just down the road a little way the highway drops down over a stretch of a couple of miles. At the bottom of the hill is the town of Indio. That hill is called Indio Hill. It’s not the longest or the steepest hill in California, but it still has to be treated with respect. If everything on your truck is working properly the hill isn’t really a problem. You can go down it in high gear, just go easy on the brakes.

As I was getting ready to pull out of my parking space Frog pulled past me and stopped with her trailer right about even with the nose of my truck. My CB rang to life with Frog’s now familiar voice. "Hey Cowboy," she said, "take a look at the back of my rig. I think I just broke a spring."

Sure enough I could see the end of one of her springs sticking out between the rear dual wheels of her trailer. "Yeah, Frog, you definitely broke one. How did you manage that?" I asked her.

"I parked in a hole and I could feel it when I pulled out."

"What are you going to do about it?" I asked.

"There isn’t a repair shop here," Frog told me. "I’ll have to get if fixed at the bottom of the hill."

"Do you think you can make it to the bottom?"

"If I take it real easy I should make it without any trouble," she said. "You go on and I’ll catch you some other time."

"No chance, Frog. I’m going to follow you down that hill to make sure you make it ok."

There was a short pause before Frog answered me. "I would really appreciate that," she said.

"Lead off," I said. "And take it really easy."

Frog pulled out of the truck stop and onto the interstate. She kept her speed down and I stayed right behind her. We were both in 5^th gear when we started down Indio Hill. We were doing about 35 miles per hour going down that hill. With my truck in such a low gear just an occasional bump on the brakes was enough to maintain that speed. I was watching Frog’s truck closely for any sign that her broken spring was about to give way when my low air pressure alarm started going off. I glanced down at my air gauge and was surprised to see how low my air pressure was. I didn’t think that I’d been using the brakes that much. I eased down on the brake pedal enough to slow my truck down even more. This allowed Frog to get ahead of me further. Then I got off of the brake completely and watched the air pressure gauge expecting it to start edging upward. It didn’t. The air gauge just sat right there where it was. My engine was starting to wind up higher than I wanted it to and the back of Frog’s rig was getting closer and closer. I realized that something was terribly wrong and here I was just about half way down Indio Hill.

I did the only thing that I could do. I checked my mirror to make sure that it was clear and gently swung my rig over into the left lane. I reached for my CB mike. "Frog," I said, "I’m going to have to take the bridle off. I’m losing air pressure. Either I’ve lost my compressor or I’ve busted an air line."

"Are you going to be okay?" Frog asked.

"I don’t know," I said. "It’s gonna be tricky."

I was afraid that my engine rpm was getting too high. I didn’t want to rev it up to high and damage it so I grabbed the shifter and put it up into 6^th gear. I gently placed my foot on the brake pedal and eased down on it. I wanted to get just enough brake to keep me from running away but not enough to overheat my brakes. I knew that as long as I kept the brake pressure steady I wouldn’t use up any more of the precious little air that was still in my tank. I kept my foot as steady as I could on the brake pedal but still my speed was inching up. Before long I could see the off ramp that would take me to the Indio Truck Stop. Another mile or so and I’d be there. The question was, could I slow down enough to take that exit?

I pressed a little more firmly on the brakes. They were still grabbing fairly well and I couldn’t see any smoke coming off of the trailer tires. Slowly my rig began to loose speed. By now the needle on my air pressure gauge was way down in the red zone. I knew that only a pound or two of air pressure was all that was keeping my spring brakes from popping and locking up. I was still going too fast for that to happen without serious consequences. If my trailer and rear truck axles were to lock up I would spin out of control. I would probably wind up rolling the rest of the way down the hill.

I put a little more pressure on the brakes.

The exit was getting closer and my speed was still too high. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, my speedometer needle began inching around to the left. It was going to be close but if I could just keep from milking the brakes any I might still be able to bring her to a controlled stop. As I started to swing my rig onto the exit ramp I could see the large yellow diamond-shaped sign that announced that the exit speed was 35 miles per hour. As I passed that sign I was doing 52.

Have I mentioned that the truck stop was on the LEFT side of the interstate? My firm steady pressure on the brake pedal was finally working. My rpm was down below 1600 by now. I could finally switch to a lower gear. The only problem was that to do that I’d have to take my foot off of the brake. To put my foot back on the brake would mean losing even more air pressure. I could just hit the clutch but then I’d lose the braking power of the engine. I held my breath and pushed in the clutch and pressed a little harder on the brake pedal.

Now, as if I didn’t have enough problems, the light at the end of the off ramp turned red. I had no choice now but to get harder on the brake. I brought my rig to a smooth stop at the edge of the intersection. The needle on the air gauge was down almost to zero. The light changed and I eased off of the brake and slowly pulled into the intersection and turned left to go under the interstate. There was still one more traffic light between the truck stop and me. If the spring brakes popped now I wouldn’t be in any danger of a skid but I’d be stranded in the middle of the street. Luckily just as I was about to tap the brakes to stop at the light it changed to green. I managed to make it through the light without using any more air and eased up into the truck stop parking lot. I immediately saw an open parking space. Normally I would have pulled past the parking space and backed my rig into it. I was afraid I just wouldn’t have enough air for that so I just nosed her straight into the parking space.

I hit the brake to bring her to a stop and suddenly the spring brakes popped. That was as far as she was going today. I climbed down out of the cab and popped the hood. The hood of a big rig opens from the rear and folds forward. I rolled the hood forward and saw a huge pool of oil under my rig. There on the side of the engine was the air compressor. There was a hole in the side of the compressor that you could have put a tennis ball through.

I stood there with my hands on my hips looking at the hole in my compressor. Soon I heard the sound of a truck engine pulling into the parking lot. I looked up in time to see Frog pulling into the parking lot. She stopped and jumped out of her truck and came over to where I was. She took one look at the side of my engine.

"You really did lose your air compressor," she said. "I thought you were just pulling my leg."

"No, I really did lose my air," I said. "That got a little hairy."

"Well, I’m going to pull mine into the shop and get that spring fixed."

"Yeah, I’m going to go see if they can do something about this too."

I watched her pull around to the shop entrance as I walked into the front of the truck stop to call my boss to tell him what had happened. The boss informed me that the engine was still under warranty and I’d have to get an authorized dealer do the work. He told me to just hang loose and he’d call the local truck dealer and get someone to come and tow my truck in. I went back out to my truck to wait on the tow truck. I never got a chance to talk to Frog after that. I never ran into her out on the road again and it wasn’t until much later that I realized that I’d never gotten around to asking her just where she got the nickname "Frog."