I have a new appreciation for those who own a truck and trailer and drive thousands of miles to take valuable livestock from one end of this country to the other, and can still maintain a sense of humor and take time to help others.

I had one such encounter recently while arranging transportation for my oldest son to get from Michigan to Minnesota to work the National Holstein Convention Sale. He needed to be there on Tuesday evening, so I began calling Saturday morning, trying to figure out who was taking the sale consignments from Michigan to Minnesota.

Several phone calls later, I finally found Brian Sparling, a trucker from Pennsylvania who happened to be there working a sale. Brian and I visited for a bit, made the arrangements and by the time I hung up, we had a meeting place, an estimated time and a plan.
As soon as I clicked my phone off, I realized I had just arranged for my son to hop in a truck with a total stranger, who I had no history with but a five-minute phone call. What had I done? What kind of mother was I?

Guilt set in and so did plan B: Try to find out who this guy was and to see if I had just tossed my kid in with some convicted felon or just a really nice guy. I know, that sounds crazy, but as a mother, this is the kind of thing that goes through your head. And a better mother than I would have checked all this out ahead of time instead of just pushing her son off a cliff!

A few texts and phone calls later, I had a background check done and I felt much better knowing he wasn’t a felon and, yes, he was indeed a really nice guy. But I had no idea how nice.

Sunday evening came and we finalized our meeting place after realizing some lines of communication had gotten crossed up. At 10 p.m., past my bedtime, we hopped in the truck and headed south to Indiana. Arriving at the local truck stop, we met Brian. He had been driving all day – starting in Maryland, going through Pennsylvania, then to Columbus and now north to Angola.
I figured he would be tired, grumpy and want J.W. to just get in the truck so he could get to his destination in Illinois. Although he had been quite pleasant on the phone and didn’t sound like a tired, grumpy trucker, I figured he was just being nice.

When we drove in, I knew he wasn’t just being nice; he was being Brian. In the middle of this truck stop parking lot, with what seemed like hundreds of semis parked all over, here was Brian bent over the tailgate of another guy’s pickup truck trying to fix his trailer lights. I have no idea how long he had been working on them, but he continued to work on them while we introduced ourselves and visited.

After seeing him pitch in to help someone else out after a long, exhausting day of driving, I realized J.W. was hopping into a flatbed pickup truck with not only a really nice guy, but someone who would go out of their way, on their way. And I would sleep well that night knowing my son was well taken care of.

Readers with questions or comments for Melissa Hart may write to her in care of this publication.