Who is Trevor you might ask? I am talking about none other than 10-4 Magazine\u2019s own Trevor Hardwick. This very talented young man was destined to be passionate, be it trucking, art, or the poetry he\u2019s shared with all of us for over the past 18 years in the magazine. I had the honor of driving his new 389 Peterbilt from ATG Interiors in Shipshewana, IN to Vancouver, WA for it to go into paint and get some other final touches, as this new truck was being tastefully transformed into a classic masterpiece. Sometimes things only get better.<\/p>ngg_shortcode_0_placeholder
After I delivered the truck to the shop, the ride from Vancouver to home was in his current truck at the time, his \u201cChasing Tomorrow\u201d Kenworth. I couldn\u2019t help remembering the days when I drove a 1989 T600 with an Aero 1 bunk on her. And then, as the icing on the cake, I got to meet Trever\u2019s mom, Cheryl. In so many of his poems, Trevor talks about his dad \u201cSmokey\u201d and the influence he was in his life and so much of what he does. However, Trevor\u2019s mom, who also drove, influenced Trevor in a positive way, as well. I thought her story of living with these two larger than life men \u2013 one her husband and one her third child \u2013 was worth telling.<\/p>
Once we finally got to meet in person, Cheryl and I hit it off, and the stories we got to share at dinner that night were awesome. Memories of days when the kids were young and so was she. She will tell you, \u201cI was a hottie back then,\u201d and the pictures I\u2019ve seen back that up 100%. When they met, Cheryl was living in an apartment and the landlord wanted to put someone quiet in the apartment above her. But, the new tenants upstairs were anything but quiet, with slamming doors and loud arguments, all while Cheryl was sitting downstairs and cringing at the noise.<\/p>
It was just before Thanksgiving when the woman upstairs left. She met the young man (only 19) when he came to her door to ask if he could use her phone, saying, \u201cHi, my name is Mike.\u201d Cheryl ended up inviting him to have Thanksgiving with her and her family, and from there things went at Monfort speed. Mike invited Cheryl to dinner with him at the Space Needle, but she told him she didn\u2019t have anything to wear. So, he bought her an outfit and told her she had no excuse. They went to dinner on December 7, 1974, and less than three months later, they got married on Valentine\u2019s Day in 1975.<\/p>
Like the song says, \u201cWe\u2019re not rich, but we have love.\u201d That love was wrapped around six amazing kids. Over the years, they moved around a lot and did what they had to do to make ends meet, and lived incredible lives, with all the stories now to remember those days. Cheryl told me, \u201cWe showed our kids everything they shouldn\u2019t do, and they have all turned out great.\u201d I want to thank Cheryl for letting me be a \u201csecond mom\u201d to Trevor \u2013 being called Mama Kim by Trevor and the love his life Alicia makes my heart happy. Alicia and Trevor make the perfect couple. I don\u2019t think anyone could understand better all his passions, supporting and helping him make all his crazy dreams come true.<\/p>
Sharing a story with me, Cheryl said she almost lost Trevor on a roller coaster before he was even born. I asked, \u201cHow could you get on a roller coaster when you were pregnant?\u201d And she answered, \u201cBecause I didn\u2019t know I was pregnant.\u201d After that ride she ended up going to the hospital, where they prescribed bed rest. Smokey stayed with her for days, with her feet up, waiting on her hand and foot, and seven months later, she had their amazing son.<\/p>
Smokey got his nickname from one of his other loves \u2013 motorcycles. He traded an old VW bus for his first Harley. Cheryl said it was a \u201cbaling wire special\u201d but he was so proud. The day they went on their first ride with friends, nobody wanted to ride behind him because that old bike smoked so bad! They started calling him Smokey that day and the nickname stuck. The bike broke down on that ride, but they finished it anyway (in the back of a pickup truck).<\/p>
In all the poems Trevor writes, you can feel the love, admiration, and lessons he learned from his dad. It was from him that Trevor got many of his amazing talents besides being a kick butt truck driver. Smokey had artistic skills, too, and was teaching Trevor how to draw box trucks when he was only three years old. Smokey stopped drawing so much when Trevor got older and got better at it than he was. Smokey and Cheryl could both write and, as we all know, Trevor excels at that, too.<\/p>
Working at UPS loading trucks, Trevor saved up enough money to buy his first truck \u2013 an old Freightliner \u2013 that he drove to his high school graduation. During his senior year he split his time between school and a trade school where he was enrolled in the diesel mechanic class. Years later, someone would find a picture in a drawer that Trevor drew all those years ago and they used it on the back of jackets that the students enrolled there can still buy today.<\/p>
On occasion, Smokey would need a co-driver, so he taught Cheryl the skills to fill that role, and she eventually got her CDL. She remembers going to Hunts Point in New York with him and tells stories of what it was like to be there (and how happy she was to leave). When they had three trucks, she sometimes would have to jump in and make a few rounds on her own. When she wasn\u2019t trucking, she would pack all six kids in the car and head to Cle Elm, WA to meet up with Smokey. With the run he was on back then, he couldn\u2019t get any closer than that to home. While they were there, they would stay in a pink hotel that the kids called The Pink House.<\/p>
When the kids were older, Trevor and his brother Ryan would sometimes go along with mom on one of her solo runs. One time, she remembers the boys thought it would be funny to set a CB up in the bunk. She thought she was talking to another driver ahead of her, but she couldn\u2019t understand why she couldn\u2019t see him. Finally, it was too much for them, and when she realized that it was them and what they had done, let\u2019s just say mom was not happy. However, this mother\u2019s revenge came swiftly.<\/p>
Stopping at a Pilot truck stop, Cheryl got the chance to talk to the manager and told him what horrible children she had. He jumped at the chance to help teach them a lesson. When they were leaving the store, the manager, along with a security officer, stopped the boys and accused them of stealing. Funny enough, whilst secretly writing this story, Trevor told me this same story during a phone call. He recalled staring angrily at his brother and thinking, \u201cWhat did you steal?\u201d But his brother was staring back at him and thinking the same thing. They both knew they hadn\u2019t taken anything, but for a few terrifying minutes, their mom relished how they squirmed. The moral of this story: don\u2019t mess with this mom!<\/p>
Back in the day, Trevor would draw pictures on napkins while he was waiting for his food, and some of the places actually pinned his pictures up on the wall. I got to meet Trevor because our mutual friend Darien Stephens told me about this young driver and the poems he wrote. We met up with Trevor and Alicia at Harris Ranch in Coalinga, CA for lunch (Alicia was with Trevor on that trip because it was her birthday). We talked on the phone for about 45 minutes and when we met up, he had a poem written on a napkin. It was the August 2006 issue of 10-4 that I got to write about that meeting and introduce our readers to this multi-talented young man. I talked to Dan about how he should be writing for the magazine, and he agreed. In January of 2008 the first \u201cPoetry In Motion\u201d column was published.<\/p>
When you talk to Trevor there is always passion and excitement in his voice, whether he\u2019s talking about an idea for a poem, his latest project restoring a truck, or an idea he has had since he was 11 about a special wrap for his trailer. Funny how it works sometimes. I hadn\u2019t quite finished this story, as I got busy and distracted by a truck show. As I went to finally write the ending, who should call me, but Trevor himself. He was all excited about his new trailer ideas, which led to some reminiscing (like the shoplifting story), and then he asked me if I\u2019d like to hear this month\u2019s poem for his Poetry in Motion column.<\/p>
The times Trevor reads his poems to me are near and dear to my heart. I had to smile inside while he read this one to me. He had no idea I was writing about his mom this month, as I wanted it to be a surprise, and he helped me with the perfect ending. This month he did include Cheryl in a line of his poem, saying, \u201cMama taught me to be humble and kind.\u201d Trevor reminisces in many of his poems of times on the road with his dad, but if it wasn\u2019t for his mom, he wouldn\u2019t even be here. And as he says so perfectly in the last lines of this month\u2019s poem, \u201cMystified to think about, the things I\u2019ve seen and done. And all I might\u2019ve missed, if I\u2019d been someone else\u2019s son.\u201d Happy Birthday, Trevor, from Mom and Mama Kim!<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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