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PHOTOS COURTESY OF DAVID & DANA WALDEN
Husband-and-wife truckers David
and Dana Walden may not work
together, but they make a point of
taking time to enjoy life as a couple.
that, looking back, he has to admit his father had a point.
“That thing Dad put in the back of my head, ‘You’ve got to pay
for the repairs,’” he said knowingly. “I had one truck for 10 years,
and I put three motors in that truck. First one was $15,000. Next
one was $18,000 and the third one was $21,000.
“Dealing with repairs is your biggest fear in this business, that
and now fuel,” he continued. “Last year, fuel just tore me up.
Running to the West Coast or Northwest was costing me $6,000
to $7,000 to go there and back to Georgia. That’s a lot of money.”
Dana, who first became captivated with driving as a child after
seeing a garbage truck in her neighborhood, said experiencing the
freedom of the road is the best thing about her long career.
It’s also taught her a lot of life lessons, including one important
one concerning team driving with her spouse.
“We only drove together for a little bit,” she said with a big
laugh. “I would choke him now if I had to ride with him.”
David’s latest rig, a 2019 International LoneStar featuring an
X15 Cummins engine and Fuller 10-speed transmission, is his
pride and joy.
“I always had Freightliners. My first was in 2001, my second
one was in 2002; got another in 2012 and in 2015,” he said. “I was
just ready for something different. I’m not a Peterbilt man at all
and Dana goes, ‘Have you seen the [International] LoneStar?’ I go,
‘Yeah, I’ve seen them on the road.’ She goes, ‘It looks like a train.’
I go, ‘To me, it looks like a 1938 Ford in the front end.’”
Driving a rig you like, as any driver will tell you, is the key
to happiness in your work, especially given the amount of time
David spends in his. He estimated he’s averaged 150,000 miles a
year going back to his company days, and says he never ran harder
than during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We hauled food boxes from Chattanooga all over the country,”
he said. “We were running out West, picking up produce, coming
right back to Georgia and the Carolinas and Florida. I’d say 2021
— I probably did almost 200,000 miles by myself that year. I was
running my butt off.”
David has grown older and wiser when it comes to his chosen
profession. He’s an owner-operator in the strictest sense, serving as
his company’s sole driver, not because the opportunity to expand
isn’t there but because of the headaches that come with having to
manage it.
“I got friends that have four, five, six trucks and I see the crap
they’ve got to go through,” he said. “I don’t want that two-in-themorning,
‘Hey, I’ve run off the road. Hey, I’ve hit somebody. Hey,
I need money for this. Hey, the truck’s tore up.’ To me, that would
just be too much.”
While the Waldens don’t travel as a team — they’re happiest
following their own paths as drivers — as a couple, they always
share the journey.
www.TheTrucker.com/Jobs the trucker jobs magazine | APRIL 2023 19