A purposeful life beyond the truck: Owner-operators Jay and Katt Hosty

As we entered the final month of 2022, I found myself in Lake Charles, Louisiana, admiring the beauty of the sunset reflecting off the lake, the rich colors of another day coming to an end. For so many of us, the holidays are the season of giving, with the sending of gifts and donations to charities of choice. Service organizations rely a great deal on our support.

There in Lake Charles December 3-10, more than 1,300 volunteers for the “Eight Days of Hope” organization came in to help a community devastated by two hurricanes, a flood, and an ice storm. This was the 18th time since 2005, after Hurricane Katrina, that the organization had helped here, marshalling 48,556 volunteers who've completed nearly 2 million combined hours of service. That’s all valued at an estimated $68.4 million worth of time and materials serving 8,600 families with rebuilding and repairing homes -- and lives, ultimately.

As I first pulled into the parking lot to check in, I couldn’t help but notice a beautiful Western Star tractor. It was obvious the owner took great pride in the truck, with the company name “Jaybird Express” of Diamondhead, Mississippi, scripted on the doors. Later at supper, in an auditorium full of people, I took notice of the man with the OOIDA jacket and was pleasantly surprised to again meet Jay Hosty, a Landstar-leased owner-operator I had briefly crossed paths with at events in years gone by.

Jay Hosty (right) with Gary BuchsIt was positively inspiring to see a truck owner not unlike myself choosing to volunteer, pausing the business for the week to help “strangers,” people to whom our only real connection is being human. The reasons people volunteer vary greatly, and every person’s story contains moments that have redirected their lives, often after persevering through their own tragedies and feeling the call to give back whenever and however possible. While Jay and family survived Katrina so many years ago now, they lost their home, truck and trailer at the time. Yet they never gave up hope, and about a year after relocated and started over.

Jay arrived in Lake Charles to volunteer and hooked up with a work team whose purpose was to remove old shingles, then repairing and replacing several roofs. Jay and his wife, Katt, have been happily married for 41 years. In addition to volunteer efforts like this one, the couple has been committed to supporting the needs of displaced children. For decades at home, they’ve served every day by providing foster care for more than 100 children, fully adopting eight. I can only imagine the struggles that Katt and Jay have faced in their efforts to provide hope for these children.

Hosty is pictured here removing shingles from a roof in need of repair.