Asked when we were little
What we'd like to be
Eighteen wheeler trucker
We knew it instantly

Going cross the country
Seeing all the land
Traveling for miles and miles
With CB in our hand

Each day a destination
With purpose as we go
Revving up the engine
Or maybe coasting slow

No matter what the weather
We always make it through
Miles and miles of road to cross
The long haul, yes it's true

Times they may be lonely
We'll stop along the way
Place to eat friends to greet
Compare our notes that day

When the run is over
It all begins once more
All across this nation
Our eighteen wheelers roar.
~ Francine Pucillo ~

      I try not to be biased, but I had my doubts about hiring Stevie. His placement counselor assured me that he would be a good, reliable busboy.

      But I had never had a mentally challenged employee and wasn't sure I wanted one.  I wasn't sure how my Customers would react to Stevie.  He was short, a little dumpy with the smooth facial features and thick-tongued speech of Down Syndrome.

      I wasn't worried about most of my trucker customers because truckers don't generally care who buses tables as long  as the meatloaf platter is good and the pies are homemade.

      The four-wheeler drivers were the ones who concerned me; the mouthy college kids traveling to school; the yuppie snobs who secretly polish their silverware with their napkins for fear of catching some dreaded "truck stop germ"; the pairs of white shirted business men on expense accounts who think every truckstop waitress wants to be flirted with.  I knew those people would be uncomfortable around Stevie so I closely watched him for the first few weeks.

      I shouldn't have worried.  After the first week, Stevie had my staff wrapped around his stubby little finger, and within a month my truck regulars had adopted him as their official truckstop mascot.  After that, I really didn't care what the rest of the customers thought of him.

      He was like a 21-year-old in blue jeans and Nikes, eager to laugh and eager to please, but fierce in his attention to his duties.  Every salt and pepper shaker was exactly in its place, not a bread crumb or coffee spill was visible when Stevie got done with the table.  Our only problem was persuading him to wait to clean a table until after the customers were finished.

      He would hover in the background, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, scanning the dining room until a table was empty.  Then he would scurry to the empty table and carefully bus dishes and glasses onto cart and meticulously wipe the table up with a practiced flourish of his rag. If he thought a customer was watching, his brow would pucker with added concentration.

     He took pride in doing his job exactly right, and you had to love how hard he tried to please each and every person he met.

      Over time we learned that he lived with his mother, a widow who was disabled after repeated surgeries for cancer. They lived on their Social Security benefits in public housing two miles from the truckstop.

      Their social worker, which stopped to check on him every so often, admitted they had fallen between the cracks. Money was tight, and what I paid him was probably the difference between them being able to live together and  Stevie being sent to a group home.

      That's why the restaurant was a gloomy place that morning last August, the first morning in three years that Stevie missed work.  He was at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester getting a new valve or something put in his heart. His social worker said that people with Down syndrome often had heart problems at an early age so this wasn't unexpected, and there was a good chance he would come through the surgery in good shape and be back at work in a few months.

     A ripple of excitement ran through the staff later that morning when word came that he was out of surgery, in recovery and doing fine.

      Frannie, head waitress, let out a war hoop and did a little dance in the aisle when she heard the good news.  Belle Ringer, one of our regular trucker customers, stared at the sight of the 50-year-old grandmother of four doing a  victory shimmy beside his table.  Frannie blushed, smoothed her apron and shot Belle Ringer a withering look.  He grinned.  "OK, Frannie, what was that all about?" he asked.  

      "We just got word that Stevie is out of surgery and is going to be okay."

     "I was wondering where he was.  I had a new joke to tell him.  What was the surgery about?"

      Frannie quickly told Belle Ringer and the other two drivers sitting at his booth about Stevie's surgery, then sighed.
     "Yeah, I'm glad he is going to be OK" she said. "But I don't know how he and his Mom are going to handle all the bills.  From what I hear, they're barely getting by as it is."

      Belle Ringer nodded thoughtfully, and Frannie hurried off to wait on the rest of her tables.  Since I hadn't had time to round up a busboy to replace Stevie and really didn't want to replace him, the girls were busing their own tables that day until we decided what to do.

      After the morning rush, Frannie walked into my office.  She had a couple of paper napkins in her hand a funny look on her face.  

      "What's up?" I asked.

      "I didn't get that table where Belle Ringer and his friends were sitting cleared off after they left, and Pony Pete and Tony Tipper were sitting there when I got back to clean it off" she said. "This was folded and tucked under a coffee cup."

      She handed the napkin to me, and three $20 bills fell onto my desk when I opened it.  On the outside, in big, bold letters, was printed "Something For Stevie." "Pony Pete asked me what that was all about," she said, "so I told about Stevie and his Mom and everything, and Pete looked at Tony and Tony looked at Pete, and they ended up giving me this." She handed me another paper napkin that had "Something For Stevie" scrawled on its outside.  Two $50 bills were tucked within its folds. Frannie looked at me with wet, shiny eyes, shook her head and said simply "truckers."

That was three months ago.