ERIK SANZENBACH / L’Observateur / January 28, 2000

Moving around the vast parking lot behind the McDonald’s on U.S. Highway 51is like walking among sleeping dinosaurs. Huge 18-wheel truck rigs tower overthe pedestrian. The constant growl of idling diesel engines fills the air as if aherd of brontosauruses were all snoring at once.

A man and a woman are standing next to a huge shiny, gray Volvo 770 diesel rig with a refrigerator trailer, (called a “reefer” in trucker parlance) attached to it. Painted across the top of the cab are the words, “LittleHouse on the Highway.”The man is a bear, tall, broad and bearded; the woman is short, bespectacled and has a wide friendly face. They are the Prays, owners and operators ofthe rig and one of the many truck-driving married couples that ply the highways of the U.S. and Canada.Frank Pray has been driving trucks for 29 years. Originally from New Jersey,he started out driving trucks to pay his way through college at Penn State.

He got a master’s degree in criminal justice and child psychology and worked for awhile as a state juvenile officer.

But trucking was his real calling, and he made it his career.

“I don’t have those nine-to-five restrictions on the road,” explains Frank.

“Trucking pays the mortgage and keeps me going.”Frank is well known out on the road. His CB handle is “Animal,” and he isrecognized in the trucker culture by his trademark top hat he wears when driving. Over the years he has done a little bit of everything in the truckingindustry from driving to being a dispatcher to managing a trucking terminal and training new drivers.

“He’s got diesel in his veins, ” jokes his wife, Joy.

“I don’t know what else I would do,” says Frank.

Joy Pray, from St. John Parish, is a former science teacher. She taughtschool for 28 years, and then in 1998, after years of urging by Frank, she decided to retire from teaching and take up long-haul trucking as a career.

“I like traveling and looking at scenery,” Joy says. “And it is good to betogether all the time.”Joy rarely drives, maybe in the truck parking lot, but as she says, “I’m not ready for that just yet.”Anyway, as Frank says, “I let her drive maybe once in a great while. I’m realleery about anyone driving my rig.”So Joy keeps Frank company, provides the navigation, and, as she says, “I’m a professional tourist and chief cook and bottle washer.”Frank believes the trend to get husband and wives to travel together is the best thing to happen to the trucking industry.

“It’s very hard to keep driving teams together,” Frank says, “but with married couples, there is no problem.”Despite a rigorous schedule of traveling between 750 and 800 miles in a 10- hour day, (by law they can only drive 10 hours at a time with an eight-hour rest), they seem to lead a rather normal life. At least it is normal fortruckers.

Calling their rig “Little House on the Highway” isn’t a joke. It really is a mobilehome.

As Frank describes his job, “It’s kind of like being a nomad with a house.”The first thing one notices climbing into the cab is the amount of room. Aperson of Frank’s stature can actually stand up straight in the cab. Behindthe driver and passenger seats is the living area of the rig, which includes a table with two seats that folds up to become a bed. Above the table isanother bed that folds down. To get into the upper berth there is a ladderthat folds up like an accordion. The Prays jokingly call it “the corporateladder.” In various nooks and crannies around the cab, one can spot a refrigerator/freezer, microwave oven, television, VCR, stereo system, CB radio, portable potty, cell phone and a coffee maker.

“We have everything here,” claims Frank, “short of a stove and a shower.””Yeah, a hot bath every night is not possible on the road,” muses Joy a bit sadly.

Creature comforts aside, the very business of trucking has changed dramatically and has entered the age of computers and high-tech.

“Trucking is not as primitive as it used to be 20 years ago,” states Frank.

Sitting next to the steering wheel is a small laptop computer which Frank says is really a fancy cell phone. He leases his truck to a company that callshim up on the computer and tells the Prays where to go, what to pick up, where to take the load and what the best route is. On top of that, becausethe computer is linked up via satellite, the company can pinpoint the location of the Pray’s rig within 50 feet anywhere in the U.S. and Canada.The Prays usually stay out a month at a time, traveling an average of 11,000 miles. To pass the time Joy likes to videotape various scenery, cutcoupons and study the map book. If the road if smooth enough, (and she saysit very rarely is, despite the air-ride seats), Joy likes to write postcards and read.

Ninety percent of their meals are eaten in the truck, and Joy says she has gotten pretty good at microwave cooking. They also eat a lot of vegetablesand fruit. During the three to four days they are at home in LaPlace, shepre-cooks all their meat and puts it in the rig’s freezer.

When they stop at night and need some entertainment they have the television and the VCR. When they get tired of tapes the Prays aresubscribers to a trucker service called Park ‘N View. When they pull into atruck stop they can plug into a system that provides phone and cable television service to the rig.

They also read a lot.

“I read a book a month, and Frank does about four to five books a month,” says Joy.

The Prays are a devout couple, and Joy says she spends a lot of time praying on the road.

“I pray for my children, grandchildren and family, and other trucker families,” she says.

On Sundays they go to the chapels located at a lot of truck stops. If there isno chapel or church, they watch religious programming on TV.

They are grandparents twice over and have two sons, one of whom wants to be a trucker.

“The only way I would recommend trucking as a career if is the driver has a real special lady at home.” says Frank. “When you’re out on the road, the wifehas to do things a husband would usually do, and that takes a real special lady.”Even though Joy enjoys the trips with her husband, she says, “I get anxious to get back.”Not so with Frank. The four to five days he spends at home can be verytrying for him.

“I get nervous sitting in one place for too long,” laughs Frank. “After I’m athome for a couple of days my sons are ready to get rid of me because I get so cranky.”Joy adds, “He needs to be on the road.” Even Frank’s dreams have to do with driving trucks.

“I would like to spend three weeks driving a truck in Australia,” he says, “because that it is really the last frontier in trucking. You can go for dayswithout seeing anyone on the road down there, and you are really on your own.”As for Joy, her ambitions are a little more down-to-earth.

“Well, I’ve already been to all 48 states,” says Joy. “That was my big dream.”She thinks a moment, then adds: “Well, maybe drive, but I’m just happy being a grandma and riding with Frank.”

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