Six months past cancer surgery and nine days shy of her 92nd birthday, Louise Spencer pushed her walker up to the door of the 18-wheeler. She scampered up into the cab — on her own, eschewing the offers of help from onlookers — and plopped down in the driver's seat behind the giant steering wheel.
"It's bigger than I am," she said.
She listened carefully as Tom Gierok, an instructor in the truck driving program at Minnesota State College Southeast, explained what all the switches, levers and gauges were for. She started the truck, eased it into gear, turned to Gierok and announced, "I have a heavy foot."
Then Spencer — who gave up her driver's license 10 years ago — pulled the big rig out of its parking spot.
She was crossing an item off her bucket list — driving a semi. In the process, she also was becoming something of a legend at the Chandler Place assisted-living center in St. Anthony.
"She has become a hero to her whole community," said Robyn Johnson, director of brand for the Goodman Group, which manages the center, shortly before Spencer was honored at a gathering in the dining hall.
Spencer was flattered by all the attention. "It makes me humble," she told her fellow residents, adding: "It's never too late to accomplish a dream. I think all of you should try it."
She was finally getting a chance to address decades of lingering curiosity. Spencer's late husband, Leo White, spent 30 years behind the wheel of a semi. At first she had stayed home to tend to their family — "four kids in 4½ years," she said. But after the couple became empty-nesters, she — and their two poodles — would often ride along with him.
