Murphy's World

Backing-around-a-bend story ends in cliffhanger

Dear Murphy,

I was 18 years old and delivering building materials to a custom home in the mountains right outside of Scottsdale, AZ. I pulled on to the job site, but had to back out around a curve that had a 35-foot gorge on one side.
     The trailer wheels made it around the curve, but then the truck stopped and the drive wheels started spinning. I said “Oh, $#*+!” as I opened the door and looked straight down to the bottom of the gorge. The left side drives were off the side of the cliff, spinning in the air.
     Thank God for differential locks!
     Cliff Hanger (not my real name)

Dear Cliff,
So what the heck happened? Obviously, you didn’t go over the edge, or we would have been reading about you in the obit section and not Murphy’s Mailbag. I take it that you and the truck somehow made it back to safety. I guess our imagination will just have to fill in the blanks.
     We hear wild stories in Murphy’s World, but usually they have definitive endings. This might be our first literal cliffhanger.
     OK, so where do we start? First of all, there are reasons why they don’t give CDLs to 18-year-olds, and your story offers yet another case in point. I’m not saying that all 18-year-olds can’t handle a big rig, but teens often think they’re invincible, which tends to lead to bad decisions…like trying to back around a curve with a 35-foot drop-off to one side. You were right about one thing: Thank God for differential locks.
     Comedian Jeff Foxworthy might have put it another way: “You might be an inexperienced teen-age truck driver…if you open up the cab door and see you’re 35 feet off the ground.”

Regards,

Murphy and Lucky Dog