Riding Shotgun: Honey, Chief Morale Officer Series

Riding Shotgun: Honey, Chief Morale Officer

Let me tell you about my co-driver.

She doesn't have a CDL. She can't read a map. Her logbook is nonexistent and her hours of service are entirely self-regulated.

But she has never once let me down out here. Not once in all the miles we've put together.

Her name is Honey. She's a Red Heeler. And she is, without question, the best thing about life in this truck.

This series is hers.

The stories of what it actually looks like to live and work in an 18-wheeler with a cattle dog who takes her job seriously — who monitors, assesses, alerts, and occasionally barks at trucks she finds suspicious for reasons known only to her.

But more than that.

The stories of what a dog does for a driver's mental health on a long run. What presence means when you've been alone for 400 miles. What it looks like when a creature is genuinely, completely content to be exactly where she is — and what that teaches you about being the same.

Honey doesn't know she's a content star. She doesn't know she has her own page on this blog. She doesn't know that strangers on the internet ask about her.

She just knows the truck is moving and she's in it and that's enough.

There's a lesson in that. I'm still learning it.

Welcome to her world.