Here Is The Whole Book,
Before You Spend A Cent.
Twenty-five short stories about what the life actually was — the trucks, the radio, the truck stops, and the price. Below is every chapter title and a full page of chapter one, word for word as it reads.
This is how the whole book reads
No lecture, no history lesson, no dates you have to remember. Just a man talking. Here is a piece of chapter one, word for word as it appears in the book.
You Were Gone
You pulled out of the yard and that was it. You were gone.
Not gone like a man who steps out for a pack of cigarettes. Gone like a stone dropped down a well. Somewhere behind you a dispatcher had a guess about where you were, and the guess got older every hour. That was the whole of it. That was the arrangement.
Nobody could ask you where you were. Nobody could move you. Nobody could tell you anything.
Here's the part that nobody understands now. That cut both ways, and the sharp side was very sharp.
Two in the morning, somewhere out in a whole lot of nothing, and something lets go. Maybe an air line. Maybe a belt. Maybe a wheel seal that's been weeping for a week and finally quits pretending. You get her stopped on the shoulder. You walk your triangles back down the road in the dark, and every four-wheeler that goes by rocks the truck sideways and takes a little more of your nerve with it.
Then you get down under her with a flashlight in your teeth.
And here's the thing. Nobody is coming. Not in an hour, not at daylight. There is no number to call because there is no phone, and the nearest exit is nine miles back, and it's cold, and you are the entire rescue.
Now, I'm not going to sit here and tell you that was better. That wouldn't be honest.
Being unreachable is a fine thing right up until you need reaching. Men got hurt out there and nobody knew for a day and a half. Men got bad news standing at a fuel desk in a room full of strangers, days after it happened, with the whole thing already decided and done without them.
But here's what it gave, and I've never been able to say it right.
For those hours, the truck was yours. Every decision in it was yours. Not one voice reaching in to ask where you were, not one screen keeping score of your foot on the pedal. You looked at the weather and the clock and the load and the hill, and you decided, and then you lived inside your own decision for four hundred miles. A man doesn't get much of that in a life. Most men get almost none of it.
You remember the first hour of a run. Yard gate behind you, mirrors clean, coffee still too hot to drink, nothing out ahead but a road and your own judgement. Go sit in that first hour again for a minute. It'll still be exactly where you left it.
All twenty-five chapters, in order
Five parts. Two or three chapters with your coffee and you'll be through it inside a week.
The Machine
- You Were Gonepulling out of the yard, and the days when nobody could find you
- You Climbed Up Into It Like a Treehousethe cabover, the length law, and what a short wheelbase does to a back
- What Your Shoulders Knewno power steering, no air, and the body that kept the week's record
- Ten Gears and an Eardouble-clutching, floating gears, and learning a truck by sound
- The Trucks That Broke Our Heartsthe ones nobody misses, and why that was never only the builder's fault
The Voice In The Dark
- Channel 19the highway you couldn't see through the windshield
- You Knew Their Voices, Never Their Facesa thousand miles with a man you'd walk past in a parking lot
- Passing It Down the Linethe warning that went backwards up the road
- When the Radios Went Quietand the part of it that was mine
- The Codeyou stopped
The Paper
- The Atlasthe book that rode in the passenger seat
- The Line a Man Had to Drawthe paper log, the clock, and what you signed your name to
- The Scalesknowing your weight before the platform told you
- The Miles You Ran Emptythe paper that said what you could touch
- Nineteen Eightywhat a load paid before, and what it paid after
The Places
- The Counter at Two in the Morninga town under one roof, and the coffee already poured
- Eight Feet of Homewhat a man does to make a box into somewhere
- The Shower, The Meal, The Three Hoursthe small mercies, and what they were carrying
- What Happened to the Counterthe trade we made, and my part in it
- Winterthe chains, the cold, and the work nobody sees
The Price
- The Payphonequarters out of the ashtray, and three minutes to say it in
- The Birthdaysthe shelf by the register, and what you guessed
- What the Body Keptthe seat, the plate, and the bill that came in late
- Why We Went Backfour in the morning, and what the town would want at seven
- The Last of a Certain Kind of Free1978, and none of us standing in it knew
The Other Pages
- Before We Startthe CB radio at the bottom of a box, and why he wrote it down at all
- Your Runa printable bonus at the very back — pages with room for your own miles, if you ever want them
- For Whoever Reads Thisthe last page of the bonus, for whoever finds your copy one day
And a bonus at the back, for whoever wants it
The last pages are a printable extra: plain questions and blank lines, in case you ever want to put your own run down on paper. The book doesn't depend on them — they're simply there for the men who do. This is what they look like.
The first truck I ever drove
What it was like the first time I pulled out of a yard alone
My handle, and where it came from
A voice I talked to for years and never met
The man who taught me — and the best thing he ever told me
The worst night I ever had out there
What it cost me
What it gave me that I wouldn't trade
What's in the bonus pages
- The Start — where you're from, the year you started, how you got into it, the first truck, and the first time you pulled out of a yard on your own.
- The Work — what you hauled, the lanes you ran most, the truck you'd take back tomorrow, the one you'd never sit in again, and a job you were proud of that nobody else would understand.
- The Radio — your handle and where it came from, a voice you knew for years and never met, and something you heard out there you've never forgotten.
- The People — the man who taught you, the best thing he ever told you, a driver who stopped for you, and one you stopped for.
- The Nights — the worst night you ever had, what it taught you, and the best night you ever had.
- The Price — what it cost you, what you missed that you'd give a good deal to have back, and what it gave you that you wouldn't trade.
- The Last Run — the year you stopped, the last load you carried, how you knew it was time, and a road you'd drive one more time if you could.
- What I'd Tell a Young Driver — five short ones, the way it would come out at a counter at two in the morning.
- For Whoever Reads This — a full page for the person who finds this after you're done with it, and a line for your signature and the date.
Who it's for
This is for you if
- You drove for a living, and nobody in your family has ever really understood what that meant.
- You'd like your grandchildren to know something more specific than "he drove a truck".
- You like a book that gets to the point and doesn't talk down to you.
- You're buying it for a father, a husband or a brother, and you want a way in.
This is not for you if
- You want a manual, a training course, or advice about the job. There is none in here.
- You want dates, tonnages and regulations. Dale writes what he saw, and hedges what he isn't sure of.
- You want somebody to tell you it was all better back then. He won't. He says where it wasn't.
- You want a long book. It's built to be read in two evenings on purpose.
Every mile of it was yours.
Fifty years on the American road, told the way it actually was. Read it in two evenings — you'll be in every chapter.
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Every Mile Was Yours is a personal memoir and keepsake journal. It is not a manual, not driver training, and not professional advice of any kind.