Attack of the Lot Lizards! Parts 1 and 2

PROLOGUE:
When people find out what it is we do, invariably a guy asks(women NEVER ask) about truck stop prostitution. Or in the vernacular of the truckers, "lot lizards." (In fact, there are stickers for sale in truck stops that have a caricature of a female lizard dressed sleazily with a circle/slash over her that says "No Lot Lizards." I see these on trucks quite frequently.) I have always answered that it isn't that prevalent. We rarely see or hear anything except in a couple of areas of the country. Of course, we don't go looking for action either, and as I have previously blogged, I don't get on the CB much at all and never in the truck stops, so its possible more is going on than we know. But South Dallas is one of those areas and was where we first really witnessed it. It was late at night and we were looking for a place to park and sleep. We were waiting to pull into the lot due to a backup at the fuel pumps, and I watched a young woman get out of one truck and go immediately to the next truck and knock on the door. As we were looking for a place to park on the lot we saw a Dallas police car cruising the lot and we knew we were not in a very reputable area of town. Another time at a different truck stop in South Dallas I watched as a woman drove her car around the lot, stopping at trucks and getting out to knock on the door. But I had never directly encountered a "lot lizard" until.....

PART 1

We were in Memphis last summer (the other area of the country where we've seen this alot) in the middle of the day. Donna was in the sleeper working on something on the computer and I was up front in the driver's seat, just looking around. And I saw a woman walking around the lot, approaching trucks and knocking on doors. The interesting thing about her was that she wasn't dressed provocatively at all. Black slacks, a colorful but non-revealing blouse, no wild make-up or hair or shoes. She would have not looked out of place at church. In fact, I wasn't sure up to this point that she was, indeed, a lot lizard. Well, she wasn't getting any takers when she looked over and saw me sitting up front and headed my way. "Oh, crap!" I thought and jumped back into the sleeper. This did not deter her and she knocked on the door. I went up front and asked, "Can I help you?" She didn't speak at all. She kind of tilted her head down, raised her eyebrows and patted her chest while looking at me with questioning eyes as if to say, "You want this?" I STILL wasn't exactly sure what was going on, so I repeated my question. Again, she didn't speak but repeated her pantomime. I finally said, "No, no thank you." and stepped back into the sleeper. She KNOCKED ON THE DOOR AGAIN!!! I looked at Donna. "You want to handle this?" She went up front. The "LL" saw her and "found" her voice; "Oh I was looking for someone else!" Yeah, I bet you were, I thought, and the woman went away.

Part 2

Well, a couple of weeks ago, we wound up in Memphis and parked at the same truck stop. We had driven all night, my shift resulted in my getting just a few hours sleep before the delivery, so I crawled into bed and went to sleep. Donna was next to me reading. I was awakened by the roaring barking of Buffett our Road Dog Golden Retriever and to an astonished expression on Donna's face. "It's that SAME WOMAN!" she exclaimed. She had approached our truck, knocked on the door, and then actually opened the door, which set off Buffett. "Oh, s***!" she exclaimed and slammed the door shut. But she continued to knock on the door, calling "Jonathan?!? Jonathan!?!" Donna never went up front and shushed me when I started to ask what in the world was going on. Eventually, she went away. And soon after, so did we.

Epilogue

In the face of this economy, it seems we are seeing more of this than we have in the past. I guess desperate times result in desperate measures for some people. I read a news report recently that noted an uptick in the number of first time criminals, notably a youth minister in south Georgia who robbed a bank due to dire financial straights. But if a woman chooses prostitution to make money, why in the world would any woman choose TRUCK STOP prostitution? I mean, as a group, these are probably the dirtiest, smelliest, foulest group of men in America! (I can say this, because, as Jeff Foxworthy says, I are one. A trucker, that is.) Of all the possible clientele a woman could target, why truckers? I guess its because they are an easy sell, due to the above reasons and the fact that they are usually very lonely. I am sad for any woman who feels so desperate as to be compelled to sell her body, but the life of a Lot Lizard is beyond my comprehension. God help them.