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The Trucker's Guide to America
A 6 episode tour of the other side of America, as narrated by the inimitable Steve Malone - long-haul trucker and blue collar philosopher extraordinaire.
For as long as he can remember Steve Malone had always wanted to travel. As a child growing up he was able to name all of the world’s capital cities and other cultures, or rather the idea of visiting other cultures, fascinated him.
Noble as they were, making his aspirations to travel the world a reality would have to wait until he was an adult. He lived with his mother on welfare in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant, one of America's poorest inner city neighborhoods. For the most part it was all they could do to pay the bills on time, let alone save for a TV, couch or anything as extravagant as a holiday.
At the age of 22, the blue-collar New Yorker decided that it was time to see the world. The big question was, ‘How was he going to do it?’ As someone from a low income background and without any qualifications, his options were limited.
The solution came to him in a moment of inspiration - long haul trucking. This is a job that would essentially pay him to follow his passion – travel. It was a stroke of genius. The perfect plan. Earn a living wage and at the same time see everything his own country could possibly have to offer.
As would quickly become apparent, the reality of this supposedly idyllic situation was quite different. The average American trucker is paid a salary of 33 cents a mile, before tax, and Stevie was no exception. The work of cross country trucking itself also involves only one thing - grinding out miles on one interstate after another. It is a job with a singular purpose - the destination - which confines its executor to an endless stretch of self-perpetuating American highway. A job without colleagues or office gossip or even a commute home at the end of the day to the family.
It is, in short, a lonely and soulless existence.
It is also utterly exhausting. When not driving, most truckers take the opportunity to sleep. Saving money is an impossibility because haulage companies pay a pittance. Besides prostitutes, referred to colloquially as 'lot lizards', truck stops have little to offer in the way of distractions and are often dangerous and dirty places.
For almost 2 decades Stevie lived like this, stuck in a rut that involved criss-crossing the U.S.A. hundreds, maybe even thousands of times – only barely catching a glimpse of what it had to offer and never quite managing to save enough money to go see it. His noble dream of visiting his country and experiencing what it had to offer lay in tatters.
In “The Trucker's Guide To America”, a 6-part series, Steve Malone is finally going to visit some of those places he always dreamt about visiting but never had the time or the money to.
Welcome to the world's first blue-collar travel show.
Destinations
The destinations for “The Trucker’s Guide” range from the Nevada desert to the forests of Wyoming. Although widely dispersed and on the surface very different, all of them have one thing in common: they each encourage and embrace a lifestyle completely different from, sometimes even at odds with, mainstream American culture. This is perhaps partially a reflection of Stevie’s own disenchantment with the American ‘system’, a result no doubt, of the way he lived for so many years.
Whether it is a place where money and all forms of transactions are outlawed (Burning Man), the no holds barred rough and ready home of America’s last vagabonds - the motorcycle gangs (Sturgis Bike Rally) or people living as if they had been taken back in time 300 years (The Renaissance Fair), “The Trucker’s Guide” is Stevie exploring different ideologies and ways of life and experiencing them first hand in his own country.
This is an ordinary man’s look, in his own quest for identity and understanding, at some very extraordinary places.
