The Biz !!

Well as promised, How I got into this biz of tour transportation and how we make it work. I started off driving a 18 wheeler about nine years ago, out of necessity, for money. Also job market really sucked where we lived. I soon became a driver trainer for the company I worked for, then started running an actual truck driving school for this same company, and had been promoted pretty high up, but as with any trucking company the profit margins are small, so I was forced out. Then I bought my own truck. That was not my wisest decision but it worked. I was killing myself for a few dollars, driving 18 and 20 hour days (no that's not legal but its not that hard to get around the legalities if you know how the system works, to make the big money) It was about this time, I thought of changing back to something to spend more time at home, but with Madasun still in bad medical shape, Monica was still not able to work. Then I ran into a friend of mine who was telling me about this tour transport and lighting company and the money I could make but not actually make;). Well it intrigued me so I called and meet with the company and here I am, travailing with the stars. Its allot less stressful and allot less miles but about the same money I was making owning my own truck killing myself. So here I am.
Now hows it been working for my home life? It works. (12 replaced cell phones, one replaced gas pedal, broken in argument over phone, and lots of flowers and apologies..... it works) Its hard but it can be done.

I, on the average, am actually home 3 month out of the year, usually not all at the same time. I grew up in a military family and was used to my dad being gone all the time so it was a pretty easy adjustment for me.

OK let me try to explain it this way. I have a unlimited cell phone package and unlimited texting, I am inconstant contact with my wife and kids. Monica would always call me and involve me in what ever was going on at the time either good or bad, we discussed punishments and rewards for the kids over the phone, I would walk her threw home repairs, or fixing the car all over the phone. Now the key to this hole situation is I have to realise that when I do come home that Monica is the King of the castle and I cant try to take over. She has certain things and ways she does things and handles the kids and I have to try to step into her program and help out instead of taken over and becoming the king of my house and doing it my way. Then I try to spend as much time just being together and doing family things, like taken trips together. Now when I'm on the road, Monica will try to fly out and spend a week or two with me if it works out. I try to get home as much as possible. The money is good and we make it work. There are a few things that get difficult while I'm away from home but we usually are good at talking them out.

So in short, the two things that keep us together I would have to say is communication and trust, along with our love for each other.
Now this thanksgiving was a bit hard, I was planning on flying home but due to circumstances beyond my control I had to stay out so we spent our thanksgiving apart physically but our harts and mind were with each other as we talked several times that day and even a few times where we don't even talk on the phone we just listen to each other breath and its a comfortable filling. I miss her and the kids but I know I am providing for them and they know as I have always promised if they need me I am never further than 24hrs from being home and I would drop anything for my family to be home if that's what I needed to do.

Just adding a little

OK Lets get this party started right! I guess I should start at the beginning, so here goes. First God created man then...oh wait, too far back... My Name is Robert Pinkley, which if you are reading this then you all ready know that. I was born November 19, 1972 in Hawaii (a military brat). I graduated high school from Altus OK in 1991, then proceeded to go to college at the University of Oklahoma. It was at this time, my life got real confusing, real fast. I was dumped by my girlfriend, got my paramedic license, started working full time, school full time, and watched my parents go thru a messy divorce after over 25 years of marriage, got a new girlfriend, dumped her then meet my now wife(who I kept), got out of college, got married, had kids, tried to settle down. Then everything got turned around. We, my wife and I, were expecting to live our normal life, raise a family, both working, me as a counselor case manager for a correctional facility and also a medic for the local ambulance crew, my wife as a medic full time for local hospital ambulance crew. You know the perfect little country house the nice picket fence the mini van (ok, ok, not the mini van. I will never drive one of those, at least not yet) and the children running around. Well we were on our way to that dream. I bought some land started getting blue prints for the house we were going to build and Monica, my wife was pregnant with our third child. All was on tract...Then the unexpected happened and my wife contracted viral menagitist and was in the hospital intensive care unit, well this virus then caused our baby, not born yet, to develop some problems unknown to us at the time. (doctors keep assuring us that the baby would be ok) My wife finally gets better , after being in the hospital for 2 weeks and comes home. Now at her next check-up, at the baby doctor, is when our life changed. I'm at work and get the phone call. "theres a problem come quick babe" I get to my wife to here the words but not understanding, They have to induce labor early the baby is in distress and has fluid on the brain and the brain has calcified causing other complications. The doctor says he does not know if the baby will survive delivery, then whether or not she will survive the brain surgery to place a shunt in her head, to drain the fluid and release the pressure after birth. Oh boy did my world come crashing down. Madasun was born March 2, 1999 in Oklahoma City Mercy hospital by C section, then flown to children's in downtown Oklahoma City. OK now Monica, my wife should have stayed in bed at the hospital resting, but when they told her they had to send Madasun to Childrens, she told them to release her with some pain meds or she was walking out AMA (against medical advice) and was going to be with her baby. Haven help a woman on a mission..they released her with some good pain medication. Day 2 of Madasuns life was spent in the surgery room where they did some brain surgery and placed a shunt in her head to drain the fluid, then the next day had to go back and revise the first shunt. The brain damage was sever and the doctors all said if she lived she would never make it past 2 or 3 yrs old. Well as if that wasn't enough; the PICU experience on two parents and two sisters worried about their daughter and little baby sister, Monica runs out of pain meds. No she did not take them all at once or take too many, this was on day two. Someone stole her pain medication, and of all the low life people to do something like that, it was one of the PICU nurses. The nurse kept trying to help us out, carry our bags, get us stuff, then when the doctors took us to the waiting room for some private one on one with him we came back and Monica went to take a pain pill and they were gone.. We told the nurse and she explained for us to go get something to eat or drink and she would look for them, when we got back she handed us the medication bottle with only 2 pills in it and there were over 30, she explained that they must have fell out of Monica's purse and spilled down the vent, because that's where she found them. I got real suspicious and called the head nurse and then called the hospital administrator. Well they searched her locker and personal belongings and found other stolen pain medications and other narcotics and arrested the nurse on the spot but did not find Monica's pills, so now she is in pain and dealing with all this stress.

Ok so this post isn't 500 pages lets skip all the details and bring you up too speed with Madasun. Madasun Victoria Pinkley is now 9yrs old and operates about a 3month old level she is in diapers, she cant hold herself up, cant roll over, cant talk, doesn't do much of anything but smile, laugh, and squall, she has got cortical blindness, she is deaf in her left ear, she has had over 20 surgeries, has hip dysplesyia, is on a feeding tube, and suffers seizures. She is on a special diet called the Ketogenic diet to control seizure activity, and she weighs about 50lbs. Typical day consist of 5 tube feeding, 8 different pills, breathing treatments, food has to be measured and mixed, numerous diaper changing, and just trying to figure out why she is crying or why she is not crying and is quite a job.

Well Monica stopped working as Madasun became a full time job and I had to make some money fast to make up for lost wages so I went into driving a truck, the money was good but being away from home was ruff, but we made it work...And that's how I came into the transportation business, as far as that house we were building...its still on the pages of the blue prints, we live on the land but I just put a modular home there till we could get back time and money to finish building our dream house.

So now a few years go buy and we have kinda got into this routine of doctor appointments and dealing with Madasun and we decided to go see a specialist for us to see if it was ok to try for another child. We were both tested and assured it would be ok so Monica started seeing a doctor in OKC that dealt with high risk pregnancy and one in our home town. She was at the doctor every week for a check up as she was now pregnant again with our fourth child, Sydnee.

Everything was going good then out of the blue my wife's water was broken and the baby went septic as did my wife, Sydnee was born and died on the same day April 21, 2004.

Now you would think that would be enough for any family to deal with but I guess God thought we needed more stress so next he took away the women that raised my wife, her Granny. Now as that would have been hard enough it was my wife who had to make the decision for her family to pull life support and let her grandmother pass away and I think that had to be the hardest decision anyone could have been asked to make. well we made it work and together we got thru that time .

But wait that still was not enough for us to deal with so God gave us another challenge. Monica was never really close to her mother as I said before she was raised by her Granny. In 2005 she started to build a relationship with her mother again, and last year she had her mother staying at our house and then on the day before my birthday her mother left our house and passed away at home due to an accidental overdose of some pain medication she was on. Now that was really hard for Monica but she is dealing with it the best she can and I am always there for her when she needs me. But now stress has taken a toll on her and she fills isolated and does not have many friends as her days are still filled with the emptiness of losing a child a mother and a grandmother all in a three year span while still taken care of Madasun on a daily basis.

OK, that gets most caught up on all of our hardships, well not all but the few big ones. We however have remained a strong and close family an always try to make each other smile and do what we can for all our daughters, Maegun 18, Sierra 14, Madasun 9. Well till next time when I explain how I gotta into this business of tour transportation and how we deal with me gone all the time...ohh and forgive all the grammar errors and spelling issues, it was past midnight when I wrote this post and I was tired.

OK, Thanks to Tim Swamb Im trying this.

Well recently I got into posting on facebook and meet up with some old friends and have found out by reading their blogs I was always informed on what they were up to as a family, well I'm not much of a talker or typer but I have been inspired by a good friend, Tim, and since I have so much free time I figured I try my hand at this blog thing. Be patient and understand its a work in progress and before you know it Ill be getting comments for me to stop ... No, just kidding. I hope to use this to inform family and friends on the things that challenge me and my family each and every day and also what its like to be a father and husband who is on the road all the time and how we make it work.. till my next blog post, be safe and come on back next time.