"TRUCK, A Quarter Life Crisis Handled Poorly" By Author: Eric Hall West

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The Author, Eric Hall West

In TRUCK you’ll find an author who knew nothing about the subject he chose to cover, until he was living it. That was the point. On this website you’ll find a self-promoter who is decidedly uncomfortable promoting himself, isn’t entirely sure how to do it, but believes strongly that the book he wrote will entertain people, hopefully make them laugh, maybe make them cry and ultimately show them a way of life that “is everywhere - and nowhere - at the same time.”

TRUCK is my first book and virtually nothing about my approach has been traditional thus far. Writing a bio for my website probably isn’t all that traditional either, but TRUCK is my Quarter-life Crisis, Handled Poorly so I figured it can’t hurt to let you know a little about me ahead of time.

I am a tail-end member of Gen-X, welcomed in to the world in the mid-70s, born and raised a proud Iowan. Iowa is either the butt of an ignorant and occasionally humorous joke or simply looked (flown) over. As an adult I know it doesn’t matter what the rest of world doesn’t know about us. We know we have a diamond out here in the middle of the rough and don’t much mind what other people think. However, as a boy, with only books, television and movies to show me the rest of the world, and rarely seeing Iowa in that mix, it became apparent I needed to leave. I needed to see the world. So I did, though I never lost too much of that Midwestern mix of wonder and pride – a sense of curiosity and adventure, an ongoing appreciation for all I didn’t know.

The first big step was to leave my home for Colorado - an adventure simplified and somewhat plasticized by the structure of four years in college where I met people I will always consider the finest among our eight billion earthbound neighbors. Always and only seeing the bright side, I remained optimistic to a fault thanks to truly incredible luck finding truly incredible people in a truly incredible place for four years – the first years away from my suburban hometown. I presumed any subsequent decisions I’d make would be as successful, equally intoxicating and at least comparably edifying.

A post-collegiate year in Sydney, peppered with backpack-fueled trips around Asia, only reinforced a naïve view that everyone, everywhere and all the time were content, they merely had different ways of achieving it. Optimism unwarranted, but instilled nonetheless, I returned to my adopted home of Colorado and got entrenched in the real world. Begrudgingly I welcomed responsibility and slowly realized the real world, and life, wasn’t all unicorns and rainbows. I knew a few more years of half-assed dedication to my work would lead to a lifetime of the same, so I left it all behind and re-embraced the optimism - the sense of wonder and adventure that had been wilting under the heat of expectation.

Three years in the real world, heading generally where I was supposed to go, I took a detour. I knew if I didn’t do something drastic I would eventually get where I was “supposed” to be, but not under the terms I wanted. I wanted to truly enjoy the ride. I wanted to take a giant leap of faith.

So, I leapt - blindly. I quit the aforementioned desk job and enrolled in trucking school. The rest is history, or a memory, or – to be precise - a memoir titled TRUCK: A Quarter Life Crisis Handled Poorly.

I am happily back in Des Moines, proud to see this diamond is even shinier than when I left it half a life ago. I am still optimistic, but no longer naïve and decidedly un-ignorant thanks to seeing the world I used to watch on TV and, most importantly, temporarily living in one specific ‘world’ where optimism is reclusive at best – deadly at worst.

I chose to drive a truck because I thought I’d see the country, write about it and get paid for it. I saw it, sort of, but I also saw reality: “It” doesn’t always work out. People aren’t always content. Life is rarely easy and occasionally, it is barely worth living. I grew up more during my time behind the wheel than any stretch prior - or since. I met people on the endless highways and roadside bars of America more foreign to me than the ones I met on dirt roads in Asia, peddling wares aside crumbling monuments in Europe or in raucous Australian pubs. They’re here for you to meet, whether you’re a driver, related to one, friends with one or, like me for the first 27 years of my life, only saw them as “eclectic, usually surly and occasionally crude footnotes from a road trip to here, there and anywhere.”