And another one bites the dust...

I'm not the most senior driver in our district, nope, I fall shamelessly somewhere in the middle. Stuck between a pay I'll never achieve and a route I never want. It's a good place, that middle that I call home. I have just enough seniority that no one above me wants my route and in the unlikely event of a layoff, I am not at risk of losing my job.

My route has been dubbed the "make you or break you" route. I have way too many kids, we're loaded to capacity... it kind of looks like a day care in there. It's not a big mileage route, but I have 58 stops. I cross railroad tracks 10 times per day. I turn around 20 times per day. My roads are super narrow, I'm talking 'if you have oncoming traffic, you just stop and make them figure out how to go around you' narrow. My roads are secondary to secondary roads and are not plowed the first day of snow plowing, nor are they plowed the second day... My ditches are so big that they look more like little rivers rather than ditches, seriously, they could swallow the bus whole. If I ever went in one of those ditches, it wouldn't be like just sliding into a ditch, it would be more like flip, roll, smash, and fill with water as we try desperately to emergency evacuate way too many kids from a flipped over smashed up bus... and I don't think you would even be able to see us from the road - I'm not testing that theory though, I'll just keep the visual and keep myself away from the ditches!

Back to the sub... Our new subs are required to ride/drive with older drivers several times before being allowed to go out on their own. They used to always drive with the most senior drivers, of which I am not. Then they drive with a driver on a "tough" route, mine has never been considered tough. UNTIL... my supervisor rode with me one day. Now, the subs ride/drive with me first. My route has broken several drivers who have claimed to drive for years in other districts, they can't handle the turn arounds, they can't handle the large number of kids, and they hate the narrow roads.

The other day I was told we had a new sub starting. She had 15 years experience driving in another district and she was currently subbing for a neighboring district. So she gets on my bus the first morning, she was to be with me for 3 days. That afternoon my supervisor says "you lost another one"...


And another sub comes...
And another sub drives...
Another sub bites the dust...