A cab is a dry box. Heat or air conditioning running for ten hours pulls the humidity down to nothing, and your hands are on a wheel the whole time. Add diesel, straps, chains and truck stop soap and you get cracked knuckles by the second week of December.
What is doing it
- Cab air. Continuous heat or A/C is continuous drying, and unlike a house there is no time away from it.
- Diesel and fuel. Solvents. They cut grease, including yours, and handling a nozzle in winter means bare hands.
- Straps, chains, tarps and dollies. Abrasion, in the cold, on skin with no flex left.
- Truck stop soap. Built to shift diesel and grime, which means it shifts everything.
- Cold to hot, repeatedly. Out of the cab into 20 degrees and back, ten times a day.
Why tallow rather than a lotion
Beef tallow is built from largely the same fatty acids your own skin produces, so it absorbs and becomes part of the barrier instead of sitting on top of it as a film. Beeswax keeps it there through a hand wash. Most pump lotion is mostly water, which is why it feels good for twenty minutes and is gone by the next break.
Why a tin suits a truck
A screw-top tin does not leak in a door pocket or a bunk cubby the way a tube does, and it does not care about being upside down. It will go solid if the cab gets cold overnight; hold it in a closed hand for a minute and it is fine. Nothing about it is ruined by freezing.
On skin that is already split
Balm on an open crack stings and will not close it. Keep it clean, cover it while it closes, and use the balm on the skin around it and everywhere else so you stop making new ones. The goal is preventing the next crack, not treating today's. Anything hot, spreading, or refusing to close needs a doctor rather than a tin.
How to use it on a working hand
- Heavy before bed. The application that actually repairs. Eight uninterrupted hours beats six rushed ones. Cotton gloves over the top if the splits are bad.
- On damp hands after washing, so there is water in the skin to hold onto.
- Knuckles and finger webs first. That is where splits start.
- Not right before gloves. Give it ten minutes to absorb.
Unscented, if you would rather
Plenty of people do not want a fragrance on their hands at work. Raw is the same seven-ingredient base with none in it.
Why a tin
A screw-top tin lives in a toolbox, a bag or a door pocket without leaking, which a tube will not. A 2oz tin lasts most people six to ten weeks at nightly use.
Made by hand in small batches in Wakarusa, Indiana. Seven ingredients, and 5% of every sale goes to FreedomSystem, which connects veterans through authentic camaraderie and meaningful programs.
