00:08 Welcome to Six-Figure Trucker, the podcast where we share advice on how to be successful in trucking and have fun while doing so. We’ll share stories, news, and advice on how to earn six figures in trucking and we’ll speak to guys and gals that are already doing so. Let’s get to the show. Hello everyone and welcome to the Six-Figure Trucker brought to you by Norton Transport. This is a venue where we elevate and celebrate the drivers of our community, of our company rather. And we have a man who joined us last week, Lewis Johnson, and he’s kind enough to join us again this week. Now, Lewis has a great set of statistics behind him as a driver. 100% on-time completion this month and this quarter. That’s impressive. And he also does a lot on the side. Lewis, how are you? I’m doing fine, yourself?

01:00 All right, thank you for joining us from that school bus you’re delivering there. And I heard through your dispatch team that you’re passionate about quite a few things and you live in Spring, Texas. Is that right? That’s correct. Now, Spring is close to Houston, suburb of Houston. Yeah. Yeah, it sure is. Just You might as well say it’s Houston, you know, if Houston hasn’t incorporated, you know, Houston is so large. It is It’s just right there. I got you. Houston’s a city that’s growing a lot these days. Too big. Now, you’re deeply involved in the community of Houston. Start with one of the groups that you’re a part of. Tell us about it and why it’s important to you. I am one of the senior executive board members for the Black Heritage Society. We host and I personally host and personally am over the Martin Luther King Day parade every January 15th.

02:03 And the festival that follows the parade itself. The parade is a big— Well, parade is a parade. They’re nice. There’s floats. They’re pretty. They’re wide. There’s people in cars and everything. But the festival’s when you can get down and personal with these dignitaries and everything. Have them come over and shake your hand and everything. And people get to meet them. There’s vendors. There’s food trucks. There’s four city blocks that are shut off and the festival is right in the middle with them. And that leads me to my next question. How many people usually come out to these four city blocks? That’s got to be a pretty good crowd. Besides the people that live downtown in the high-rises, my biggest audience for the festival itself is 6,700 that we count. Wow. 6,700 people. Wow. How much time does that take for you to invest into it to make sure that it’s pulled off correctly? We were starting now, to tell you the truth, planning the festival.

03:06 And as a matter of fact, we’re going to have a board meeting here in about 2 weeks. Okay. And but it takes about that time to get everything together, get people to want to be in the parade, want to be in the festival. I’m personally over the entertainment and the vendors that goes on in the festival. That’s my hand there. But I do collaborate on getting everybody in the festival. Everybody from senators, mayors, athletes, pro athletes, and big-time singers, too. Have you had any of the Texans involved in this or any of the Astros? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. We give them for last we had about four five of the Texans. Had Andre Johnson one year. Oh, wow. Mhm. Warren Moon has came. I live in Spring. There is in my subdivision four NFL ex-football players and four Super Bowl champions.

04:12 Oh, wow. One lives right down street from me that he can see my house. In fact, he called me today talking about a roofer cuz he was getting a new roof on his house and the last storm we had I had one or two shingles that it that was missing that I looked at. So, we were all getting together to do that. So, his name is Robert Jackson. Robert Jackson, Reginald Phillips, number 84 for the Houston Oilers back in the day. He was a punt returner. I call roaches. Okay.

04:48 Call roaches if you remember him. Reginald Phillips and Ronnie James. He used to play for—

04:54 Big-time people at this parade and festival.

04:57 Oh, yeah. We at the festival we’ve had Shaq. And we have Shaq. We’ve had Shawnee. We’ve had— What’s the young lady? Megan Thee Stallion. 50 Cents, Jamie Fox. Ooh. Sylvester Turner, Senator Congressman Al Green. That’s impressive, man. That’s a great list of people that have been there. And what inspires you to do this to be on the board and to serve, give your time to make this a very fun event and obviously a worthwhile event MLK. Well, my mother kind of like threw me in that type of arena a long time ago to where you can have multiple careers, multiple things that you can do. But most of the time she would to say, “Go join something.” You know what I’m saying? And I’m not just talking about football or something. And this is her words. You go join something. Join the NAACP, join the new lag, join Christian organizations, all kinds of different organizations she wanted me to be a part of.

06:11 And so I’m a registered MC on also. So I can speak at any function. Sometimes I’m kind of a comedian at the function to introduce some people, you know. Right. And let them know how to do it.

06:24 You can definitely speak. You’ve got the gift of gab. Thank you. Thank you. Well, everybody can. The heritage group that you’re a part of, that’s not the only one you’re a part of. You were sharing with me earlier, there’s another one that’s near and dear to your heart.

06:39 Yeah. Yeah. Actually, this organization got me into the Black Heritage. It’s called the Break Free Ministries and Productions. And the CEO of that is a Fort Bend County, well, Missouri City, Texas sheriff. She’s a first lady cuz her husband’s a pastor, and she’s a playwright, a producer, and a screenwriter, okay?

07:09 Okay. So I was in one of her plays. Okay. Yeah, I was in one of her plays in 2017. And the president of the Black Heritage Society, when we had intermission, walked straight up to me and asked if I could join her board. She didn’t just say come be a board member or a volunteer. She asked me, “I want you to be on my executive board member.” That’s awesome. Yeah. So I’m sitting in the room sitting in back rooms with people who I admire, you know, Sheena Easton and Al Green, you know, right now. Wow. That’s impressive, man. So, it means a lot to you not only being a successful truck driver, but being very deeply involved in your community. And you had said that your mother had kind of instilled this in you. And is this something that carries over to your own family? Yeah. Yeah, my two sons are kind of into it and they into their own world, too, you know.

08:10 But, anytime I ask them to assist me in doing anything, they’re coming to do something. Set up a tent or something, volunteer, pass out food, because we’re advocates for domestic violence, mental illness, gun control, and human trafficking. That is all noble causes. Mhm. There you got it. Now, how do you balance your time on the road and the commitments you have with these organizations you’re a part of? It be pretty hard. Again, mother says you spread yourself too thin, you know. I’m a saver, you know. I come and help people without any kind of thought, you know what I’m saying? If you need help, I’m there. You know what I’m saying? If I see you destitute, you need money, my wife all I’ve gotten brand new shoes hit across my head because a lady she was pretty able.

09:11 She bought six pair of shoes and she needed a ball. And I asked my wife, I said, “Babe, can I give her this dollar?” Cuz she was in the head of us. I want to get her out the way. She said, “Yeah.” Yeah, I gave her a dollar and went on. Then, as we were walking out of the ball, my wife hit me aside the head. She said, “You crazy. You could have— And that’s what she wanted you to do, cuz she was holding up the line. You should have— She should have put a bundle’s pair of shoes back. You know what I’m saying? She didn’t have enough money.”

09:42 She had to have six of them. Yeah, I said, “Babe, I wouldn’t think of it.” But she had a daughter with her, too. I said, “Babe, I wouldn’t think about that. I just wanted her to get out the way.” And a dollar—

09:50 Right. You don’t want to come between a lady and her shoes. I was like, “And a dollar’s nothing.” So you give her a dollar, let it go on so we can have our day, you know. Okay. Well, Lewis, thank you very much for joining and sharing so much of your passion with us, what you’re part of your communities and being involved with those and I got to say keep doing that, keep on trucking. I appreciate it. I appreciate it. Thank you so very much. Can I just say this one little bit? You bet. Since I’m an advocate with Martin Luther King and I’m thinking like the way they keep me around is because I guess my thinking. And I’m thinking Martin Luther King was an advocate for not only just black equal rights, but for all and for everybody.

10:35 Right. So I’ll put it to them. I said, “What would he say today in 2014 2000 2020 2022 2023?” And this is definitely what I told them that. I said, “Well, he would want everybody.” So when I put on these festivals you know, and don’t let the name fool you. They said black heritage. I have had Asian, Hispanics all race ethnicities in this festival. Everybody. If you want to come and participate, you participate. Cuz as I say, a lot of people live downtown and they come to the festival really almost by accident. They’d be out there walking their dog downtown. Next thing you know, they’re eating. They’re patronizing the vendors or something like that, you know, having a good time. And one and a half of I discovered two or three young men just like to sing real quickly, just like the scene on Forrest Gump when Jenny was up on the Senate of the White House there.

11:44 Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And he seen her up there and he jumped in the pond to come and talk to her. This young man at this time was 8 years old did the same thing. And he came across the pond down in Houston ran up because I had about an hour left and then I gave open mic. And I told everybody who want to do something, you know, who want to sing, who have any talent, come down now the time we have about an hour left. And so he was standing over there next to me next to my DJ soaking wet, you know. He’s tugging me, “But Mr. Lewis, you said that anybody want to do something, anybody want to do something.” I said, “Yeah.” I said, “Well, okay, what you do?” He said, “I rap, sing, and dance.” Okay, he 8 years old. Wow. I rap, sing, and dance. I said, “Well, is it clean?” He said, “Yeah, if it weren’t clean, my mama would beat me.” I said, “Okay, I’m going to put you on.”

12:39 So I put him on next. I put him on next. I promise you. This young man got on the stage and you thought you were listening to a 20 30-year-old professional. You would think you were listening to Tupac and Biggie Smalls at the same time. There’s a lot of talent out there. Yeah, he was phenomenal. He was so phenomenal. Bun B was in the audience. 50 Cent was in the audience. They all I’ll tell you what, everybody was paying attention to what they was doing, they was round vending and everything. And but when that young man got on stage he pulled everybody to the stage with the way he carried himself.

13:28 So now I’m like a manager for him. Now you ask what am I going to do with all my time and everything? If Bun B kind of like got has it and he’s grooming him. He said the boy was phenomenal. He was great, but I need to season him a little bit more. Now I’m his manager, but I’m letting Bun B kind of cultivate him a little bit, you know what I’m saying?

13:53 Got you. Is this somebody we can expect to see down the road? He can make it big? Well, I’ll tell you what, he was in last year’s festival at 9:00 and he did good. He did a whole lot better. He’s going to be spectacular. I’m going to say maybe 12, 13. He may be making records, you know.

14:14 Wow. He may be making—

14:16 Lewis safety so much for joining us, sharing these rich stories with us. We appreciate it very much. Thank you, Lewis. You’re quite welcome. Again, I really appreciate you. It’s a good little 30-minute break. Be careful out there. Okay, appreciate you so much. Thank you. Six-Figure Trucker is brought to you by Norton Transport. Norton Transport is a driveaway trucking company that customers can rely on. It offers excellent independent contract driving opportunities to professional, courteous, and qualified drivers that can provide the kind of service we deliver. If you’re interested in learning more about Norton or just want to subscribe to the show, check out Six-FigureTrucker.com. That’s Six-FigureTrucker.com.