Happy trails, Marilyn!

Well, before I begin this entry, let me just say in my defense that I just couldn‘t resist. Our publication‘s long time managing editor, Marilyn Wilson, just retired after over two DECADES editing and untangling the (at times!!) garbled prose of hacks like myself. Now, she made me PROMISE not to write about what she and her husband Nick plan to do with their retirement ... ah, but Marilyn, I had my fingers crossed behind my back when I promised! And as you well know, that cancels out said promise!!!

(Let it be known, too, that Marilyn has a degree is child psychology ... quite germane to a career spent dealing with microscopic juvenile minds like mine!!)

Anyways!

Marilyn and Nick are - as we speak - heading out to traverse this great country of ours by mobile home. Specifically, pulling a house trailer with a big Ford F-350. The first stop on Marilyn and Nick‘s nationwide tour is the sunny state of Florida (and oh how we are envious!) But then any number of destinations may follow next: Civil war battlefields, the Grand Canyon; the St. Louis Arch; the brew pubs of Indianapolis (Well ... maybe not those. But I‘d sure like to visit them!)

(Marilyn will be driving a Ford F-350 like this one cross country over the next few months)

At our Fleet of the Year awards dinner recently, we talked about Marilyn‘s upcoming adventures on the roads and H. Craig Jackson, a vice president of sales with Con-way Freight, noted that the F-350 is no little pickup. “That‘s a real truck, now!” he remarked. “That‘s got some serious power!” All the more fitting for a (now former) trucking editor to be tooling around in, I say.

(That's Jackson in the middle accepting the 2007 For-Hire Fleet of the Year award for Con-way Freight)

So, to you Marilyn: I wish you the best of luck, the best weather, the best food, the best of everything. It‘s going to be so different around here now with you gone - though we can‘t wait to hear about your tales from the road. I've personally treasured getting to know you over the past eight years I've been at FleetOwner (and has it really been that long??!!). Have a great time - we‘re going to miss you!