Started when I was 12 years old. At that time my buddies and I would hitch from our small (pop 576) town to the nearby (12 miles) city (pop 11,000) for whatever attractions small cities held for small-town boys. Usually it was to go to the movies, visit someone's cousin, get a pizza.... We never went alone and we always got picked up by someone we knew...in those days, living in a small border town, everybody knew everybody anyway. Before I went in the Navy at 19 I never had a vehicle of my own. I went to college 100 miles away, hitched back and forth. That ended first semester and I went to work in Syracuse, 120 miles away...hitched back and forth weekends. Hitched a couple hundred miles to my uncle's place to go deer hunting with the family....often had a cased long gun with me, no problem. Once, heading home from Syracuse an early '50's Ford came screeching to a stop, I went running up to jump in just as a cop pulled up behind them. Two guys in the front, six pack between them, open beers all around....like a lot of guys from Northern New York they worked in Syracuse during the week, went home weekends, drinking all the way....the way it was in those days. Cop took one look, asked all the pertinent questions, said to the guys in the car, "You're all too drunk to drive." Looked a me, said, "You got a license?" "Yep" "Okay," pointed a me, "I'll let you guys go, but he drives." I drove them a couple hours north until , got out at a fork in the road where our ways parted. Great trip...
I've picked up a lot of hitchhikers over the years, never had any problems, but I don't any more. Most of them you see look like they'd just reek of cigarette smoke, makes my nose run just to look at them....don't need it stinking up my truck. Also, today people have it pretty good someone who hasn't got a vehicle of their own.....wellllll.......hmmmmm......you know what I mean?
