Once you start school there is a time honored tradition that happens every single year without fail of your entire educational career. Half way between bleary eyed and bright eyed and bushy tailed, sparkled and shined sporting new clothes, new shoes, and loaded down with backpacks filled to overflowing with pens, notebooks, crayons, and markers the kids stand at attention for that first day of school photo op.
You tick off everything in your head… lunch money, gym shoes, backpack check! You hope that nothing has been forgotten. You find the perfect setting. You know the one where shadows won’t block their smiling faces. Smile! Stand up straight! Move closer together! They oblige and you capture that moment forever to be compared in years to come with other first days of school. If you are a trucker’s wife, you document those smiles with your cell phone then send them to your husband so he can share the moment too.
You can hardly fathom how much they have changed from one year to the next. Time goes by so swiftly! Wasn’t it only yesterday when summer vacation began? You say goodbye to carousing half the night and sleeping late, and hello to early mornings. With a hug and kiss they are on their way, and you return to a silent house. And so it begins and you know you will treasure these snapshots forever until next time when I give you another glimpse into the life of a trucker’s wife.



