Success.

Feeling incredibly accomplished today. Really do my best to stay humble and not think about where I am at, focus more on where I am going and want to be headed.

Today however, I’ve woken up feeling very grateful for all of the things Megan and I have. What we have accomplished in the years. More than anything, from a selfish point of view — I can see that former crossroads and am happy with the path found that lead me here.

10 years ago, in 2009 I was freshly kicked out of the state of Hawai’i. It was part of a probationary period of 5 years to be served in Colorado for the multiple felonies I had committed. Which thanks to a first-time offense guilty plea was a deferred sentence.

I was in part able to get this sentence because my parents had a college fund saved up from the time I was a baby — which they drained entirely to pay for my lawyer and legal fees. So few people have that kind of monetary support in our legal system I would be remiss to not mention that very big factor in me not being now, a career criminal just to survive in prison.

This meant that I was not officially convicted of any crimes, even with a guilty plea, as long as I kept my nose out of the dirt and stuck to being a stand-up contributing member of society.

Because I have succeeded in this act if you run a background check on me today you will not pull anything up. My criminal record is entirely clean and I have paperwork showing that the expungement of those records in the judicial system has happened.

On moving back to Colorado I got a job as a retail clerk in an educational toy store. I was making $7.50 an hour. College was no longer an option — there was no fund for it and my one semester at U of H Manoa got me put on academic probation. School was not my focus nor has it ever been my strong suit.

At that point in time I thought that I may be working at a dead-end job with no prospects for the rest of my life. Thankfully I had a good support system around me including friends, family, and of course my wife Megan. They saw more in me and pushed me when I couldn’t push myself.

Ten years later Megan and I are living in our second home after selling our first — we’ve moved to a new place for the two of us to truly learn and explore together, Las Vegas. We live in Mountain’s Edge, a place that is in our opinion a nicer community with much more amenities for us to enjoy and raise a child in. We have a much nicer home and have gotten away from the snow to boot.

Exploration-Peak
A view from the top of Exploration Peak park of some of our Mountain’s Edge community.

I’ve written more about my journey to working with The Motorcycle Company previously — but I am still with them and have been for  6 of these 10 years. We are now up to 10 dealerships, 10! From the 3 we had when I was hired. I owe so much to them as well for making all of this possible. Being able to work from home remotely, the trust they have in me to do my work. The people I work with that make it all worthwhile, and the best manager I have ever had in my life in Kristen Kunzman.

Megan is going to school and when she graduates we hit the ground running on our own business together with her as the real talent (licensed massage therapist, life coach, advocate for healthy living and survivors of domestic abuse). Though of course my contributions to our business cannot interfere with my work with TMC. They are all too important for us to allow that to falter.

Over the weekend we took the motorcycle out that we 100% own for a ride around our new home. We saw so much of the beautiful Las Vegas landscape that we hadn’t gotten to in the 6 months we’ve lived here because we’ve had our heads down grinding away.

Think we all need to take the time to recognize our accomplishments sometimes and today I woke up really feeling it.

Megan, I’m so looking forward to seeing what we accomplish in the next 10 years. I know I wouldn’t be here without you. So glad we found one another.

Thank you for reading.

If you have interest in reading anything else I have written please check the Table of Contents, here.

©2019 Trevor Elms

August Update

Been awhile since I have posted anything. I have started a number of works but just haven’t finished. Been focused on work and other things. Did want to make a quick little post just to say that I am okay and things are going well for me. I just haven’t been using my free time to sit down and write — and I haven’t been heavily inspired as to push me towards it in a bit. That’s life though, I will feel the need to put down words or finish one of my drafts soon. I can feel it.

In the meantime, though — I wanted to post something a little different. One of my friends has been working on his own YouTube channel about all things geek for the last couple of years. Over the last six months or so him and I had been in talks about a new show for his channel about comic books. I absolutely love comic books and so was intrigued by the idea.

Fast forward to yesterday and the very first episode of Zero Issue dropped. It’s an episode about where to get into Batman if you have any interest and there’s a little bit of a book club discussion.

I really enjoyed myself and enjoy being a part of this channel that just wants to celebrate geek culture and the interests involved with it. So, check out the video below if you have interest and let me know what you think!

Thank you for checking this out.

If you have interest in reading anything else I have written please check the Table of Contents, here.

©2017 Trevor Elms

Scattered.

Something I wrote September 17th, 2008. This, for me, may be the most beautiful poem I have ever written. I am not sure if I am capable of writing anything like this ever again, and it pains me.

I was so terribly broken when I wrote this. I wrote in this poem what writing means to me in a way that actively makes me feel the pain I was feeling — and how writing wouldn’t help, no matter how hard I tried.

Scattered.

I thought it was gone,
but now it’s come back.

As I lay down, my thoughts begin to snap.

I cannot find the peace and tranquility —
that is to thrive in dream-filled continuity.

Then to pass the time away,
scribbling, scratching, thoughts — ’til I decay.

I eventually crash when the sun arises,
a new day.

Though I despise this repetition,
what I reap in reprisal is refinement.

Reflectively recording all rational thought.

On scattered shreds of my soul…

 

I wrote recently about gaining my love for music back, and I did also write my first poem in years the other day. However I have not yet unlocked poetry within me. I need that again, it’s my favorite thing about language.

Thank you for reading.

©2008 Trevor Elms
Featured photo by John Elms ©2014

Natureless.

August, 2008 – I believe I wrote this just before moving to Hawai’i and was in my parents’ house. I wrote this after smoking a cigarette on my parents’ back porch and having a hummingbird flip in to take a drink.

I was not sober at this time, but it was well before things got out of hand. Not that I don’t agree with what was written here, but I was also going through a very typical anti-establishment phase at the time as well.

Natureless.

What the heck was that?! A Helicopter?

I turn my head and stop breathing the moment I see it.

 

A Humming Bird,  hovering inches from my nose.
It pivots,

one-hundred-and-eighty degrees,


zips upwards and lands no less than one foot away,

on the feeder just above my head.


And here I am, standing.

Frozen.

 

Wide eyed and gaping mouth,

watching one of the most beautiful and special creatures,

on this, our Mother Earth,

inches from my pupils.

 

It makes me wonder,

why we drop bombs…

 

But, I guess you don’t know what you have, until it’s gone.

 

 

With my supposed message here, the irony of me smoking cigarettes as well as littering with them at times is not lost on me. The featured photo in this post was taken during the summer that I wrote this poem.

©2008 Trevor Elms
Featured photo taken by Trevor Elms ©2008

Pathways.

November 5th, 2008. One of the more depressing things I have found that I wrote. There’s really no optimism in this whatsoever. At least that I am gleaning from it. I feel like this was when I was really beginning my downward turn. My brother Alan would tell you the same. As later that month when I visited home for Thanksgiving he became very worried about me.

Pathways

Where does this path of mine lead?

It winds,

It twists,

It involves the leaves and the trees.

 

Stumbled have I, at the start.

Too easy is it,

to play when the pathway gets dark.

 

Nightmares of failure and disappointment,

haunt equilibrium and comfort.

 

Hoping the stride here isn’t futile,

Another broken heart.

 

I’m very happy to be taking medication for my bi-polar these days.

Thank you for reading.

©2008 Trevor Elms
Featured photo by Trevor Elms ©2016

I need a place for these things.

©2013 Trevor Elms

I love to write.

Sometimes I love to apply myself to some writing and then abandon it. I’ve done it plenty of times.

I want to post some of my writing here so it has a place it can be viewed by others, but also connected to me. Perhaps some feedback will prompt me to write some more.

You can scroll below to go chronologically to how I have posted, or pick a category up above. There is also the table of contents. Thanks to those who spend any time here at all and read any of my writing. It is appreciated.

–  Trevor

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©2017 Trevor Elms