Is Your Banana Truck Out of Control?
There was a song I used to listen to as a kid, by Harry Chapin, called “30,000 Pounds of Bananas.” It reminds me now, as a grown woman, of how life can so easily get out of control.
The song is a story about a tractor-trailer hauling—you guessed it—30,000 pounds of bananas. It’s motoring adorably along, on its way to Scranton, Pennsylvania, when suddenly the brakes give out as the truck descends a steep, two-mile hill. The tempo gains speed as Chapin sings of the truck barreling down the hill out of control.
“God! Make it a dream!” screams the young driver, who, with his truck and bananas, eventually comes to a tragic and messy stop at the bottom of the hill. The song feels lighthearted, but in the end, the driver is decapitated amongst 30,000 pounds of mashed bananas.
Ever feel like that driver? I do. “God, make it a dream!” I pray, as life careens out of control in the very messy middle of a husband gone for work, mothering, homeschooling my kids, a long to-do list, and too many commitments.
Use Habits to Avoid a Crash
The times when I feel most like I have crashed my charming banana truck and am buried under yellow mush are usually when I have fallen out of habits I know to be life-sustaining, like a dedicated quiet time of reading, prayer, and coffee (alone) in the mornings, or sitting down to a real meal with my family, complete with vegetables and conversation, or our nighttime prayer liturgy, which raises our young ones in the faith day-by-day.
I’m a firm believer in the power of habits, and in the homeschool circles I run in, they’re often and effectively used as a tool for learning. Habits can be a cornerstone of a productive and satisfactory life. If you’re revamping your habits this New Year, the best book I’ve read on the subject is James Clear’s Atomic Habits. Regular practices are good for us. That’s why God instituted the cycle of work and rest when he created the world in six days and rested on the seventh. The Sabbath refreshments of God’s Word, the sacraments, and Christian fellowship are necessary to refuel us every week, lest we run on empty. Habits can act like an autopilot, keeping us aimed in the right general direction.
But there’s a balance there, right? Good habits aren’t enough to calm the crazy world around us, and it can be tempting to think that if we just have all the right habits, we’ll never have an “off” day again. Good habits can’t save us. How does one survive with one’s faith intact when the gravity of hedonism and self-reliance pulls us downhill with ever-increasing speed? How can we avoid crashing our banana trucks?
Giving Up Control
Perhaps an attitude of “Jesus take the wheel,” is the best approach to getting through those times in life when everything is plummeting out of control.
I cringe to even write those words because they are so corny. My “Jesus take the wheel” moments do not look like some pious surrender of my troubles to a God who is happy to take them (though he is). My moments of giving up control over my life and my future look a lot more like a petulant three-year-old screaming and thrashing in the middle of the Costco checkout line: I scream until I run out of energy and fall asleep. Everyone is staring. My strong Father picks me up and carries me to the car, buckling me up for safety and driving me where we need to go.
What if I gave in to my Father’s direction just a tiny bit earlier and came to Sabbath rest with a little less fight? I’m sure God would be pleased if I gave up control just a little more easily. I’m no expert here, but I imagine this sort of practice is a lot like the maturity that slowly develops in a growing three-year-old with attentive and patient parents. We are God’s children, after all.
The Story Behind the Song
One thing I learned recently that I hadn’t known when I sang along to “30,000 Pounds of Bananas” as a kid is that the song is based on real events. Eugene P. Sesky was the thirty-three-year-old driver whose left foot hit the floor when he tried pressing the clutch as he descended the Moosic Street hill, where highway 307 enters Scranton. He had planned to go home to his wife and three kids that March morning in 1965 after his route was over. Instead, he tried to no avail to get his truck full of fifteen tons of bananas to slow.
When Eugene realized the truck wasn’t going to stop, he swerved to avoid pedestrians. He hung out of the cab as he steered, honked the horn, and yelled for people to get out of the way. He died when the truck finally flipped over and crashed into a house at the bottom of the hill. Eugene was a hero who saved many lives by steering his runaway truck away from a service station and all the fuel that could have exploded. He could have jumped from the truck and saved his own life, but he chose to protect others instead.
Sometimes, life really does get crazier than we ever thought it could. No amount of good habits, effort, or skill can stop a crisis from happening. I’d like to think that, like Eugene Sesky, we can think of others when our lives get out of control, but we can only do that when we give up control and let our strong Father hold us in our moments of need.
is a homeschooling mom of five and proud Navy wife. She works hard to be what Chesterton called a “Jill-of-all-trades,” chronically trying new projects for the sheer joy of exploration. She’s addicted to coffee, enjoys dark beer, and loves to be in the mountains. She writes at HomeschoolFamilyCulture.com, and you can find her on Instagram @rhikutzer.
Photograph © Lotte Löhr, used with permission
