Technician retired at truck driver

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After he retired too early, Daniel Turenne returned to the labour market in recycling in trucking.

Martine Turenne

Saturday, February 3, 2018 01:00

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Saturday, February 3, 2018 01:00

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On the day of his 65 years, on the 19th of January last, Daniel Turenne was at Salinas, in Monterey county, California. Not to celebrate this age symbolic in the West, synonymous with retirement, but to pick up a cargo of vegetables, in one of the mega-warehouses of this city of 150 000 inhabitants nicknamed the ” capital of lettuce “.

“I celebrated it by returning to Québec,” says the one who lives in the capital since adolescence.

As a truck driver of a 18-wheel, Daniel can only take a drop of alcohol during the six days of its return trip of 10 000 km from Joliette to California.

A new job : he became a truck driver to 64 years of age, after nearly 10 years of retirement. An atypical but increasingly common.

Freedom 55

Daniel, however, was the prototype of the slogan, ” Freedom 55 “. It is at this age that he takes his – first – retirement. Xerox, his employer for 30 years, is in full restructuring, and offers its older employees two years of salary if they leave the company.

“It was too expensive. “

Photocopiers to its beginning, passing by the printers to the top laser, the technician was then network analyst, responsible for the implementation of fax multi-function for customers.

“I was not yet tired of my job. But the offer was tempting. “

He said yes to the severance pay. “Having known this, I would not have had to accept it. “

Caravan, golf, Florida…

Daniel and his wife, Mariette, already retired, bought a trailer and will take the lead of thousands of other Quebecers : Florida. Six months per year, for nine years, they migrate to Orange City between Daytona and Orlando.

On the program : golf and relaxation, interspersed with a few stays in Europe. The rest of the year goes to Quebec, where they live with their two children and their four grandchildren.

And then, the reality has caught up. The pension fund at Xerox melts like snow in the sun. He had moved from a defined contribution provision not specified… a difference ! We know what we put into it, but not what you will receive.

“The market has messed up,” he said. The interest on the income frisaient the 1 %… there was a huge difference between my expectations and reality. “

It was necessary to stop the bleeding. “I was 64 years old when I said to myself : it takes me an extra income for the next five years. I am in perfect health. “

But there was something else. “I was blasé. I was missing something. I said to myself that I could do a lot more than what I was doing there. I had stopped a blow dry, 10 years earlier. I was not ready. “

The job of a trucker is only natural. “It has always interested me by the band. I’m used to riding in the United States, I am bilingual, and I didn’t want to work 9 to 5. “

Back on the benches… truck

Upon his return to Florida, in the spring of 2015, Daniel is enrolled in a DEP, option trucking. Not obvious. The secretary to the admission requires a high school Diploma… modern. It has a classical course. “I explained to him that I had done a technical diploma in electronics from cégep Limoilou and, therefore, that I have done a course in high school, if I was a college graduate, but it was no good ! It wanted to ! It took the intervention of a superior to make him hear reason. “

Daniel returns to school, which are, especially, those of a large truck. The 600-hour course, spread over five months, are essentially practical.

In August 2015, the new graduate goes to a fair of jobs which are invited several of transport companies. We remind you). He goes from driving tests and receives a letter of refusal very original : he had written “it’s not the driving that counts… “”OK, so what else’s account, otherwise my age ?” he said.

On american roads

But in addition to this episode of ageism, he quickly finds a job at DFS (Dan Fray System), a company of Joliette. It is now at the wheel of a truck refrigerated to 35 feet and 18 wheels.

As with several other truck drivers at DFS, it has a status of ” retired “. He has the obligation as a trip of six days every 35 days, while “regular” may not take more than seven days off in a row.

He went so regularly with his colleague, retired like himself, on the road : Joliette, Windsor, Michigan, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, Nevada, and California, the final destination. In the winter, it is more Texas. He will wear what he carries (tires, box mattress, fertilizer) and yields of fruits and vegetables.

Six days to live and sleep in the truck, with stops at the Flying J, where there is a shower and a restoration. When he draws the curtain of his ” sanctuary “, as he calls the rear compartment of the truck, it can sleep six hours in line.

And he loves it. “It is very fun. I see the landscapes amazing, the deserts of the West, California, New Mexico… And it makes me a good income booster. “

The only thing that stop it, it is his physical condition. “A cardiovascular event, or my vision, which continues to decline. Because the work is not tiring physically. “

His family life is of course ” upside down “. It will renew Mariette in Florida for the winter. But nothing there makes never for work. Not enough pay, ” he said. These are trips of three days only.

Florida would be his haven of rest… in the meantime its next – real – retirement. If he takes it !