Power on the Road, Peace at Home

“I run 577 miles a day, six days a week,” Leslie Williams says. A long-haul truck driver from Farmington, Leslie, and his wife share four children and ten grandchildren between them. A US Army veteran who served in Somalia, he speaks candidly about the PTSD that followed his service and the long years on the road that taught him to plan for the unexpected.

Over decades behind the wheel—“I’ve been a truck driver for almost 32 years now”—he has built a practical approach to staying powered: compact units in his truck for roadside breakdowns and a stack of Jackery units at home to keep medicines, a TV, and essential comforts running. When the power goes out in a storm or his truck quits on the roadside, his answer is simple and unmistakable: “What are we gonna do? Turn it on.”

Life Between Miles

Leslie Williams keeps a small, steady life, moving from a modest home in the City of Farmington to the long stretches of highway where he earns his living. Leslie and his wife, Karen, have four children and ten grandchildren. He runs roughly 577 miles a day, six days a week. It is a rhythm that has shaped how he thinks about preparedness and the small comforts that make a long haul feel like home.

Leslie is a US Army veteran who served in Somalia and is candid about the scars that service left behind. After decades on the move and many difficult years in hospitals and waiting rooms, he has learned to build pockets of calm wherever he goes. Over the years, Leslie has built up an impressive collection of 22 Jackery units, each playing a role in keeping his home and family powered through everyday needs and unexpected challenges.

A Quiet Replacement

For years, Leslie relied on gas generators when he needed power off-grid before he switched to Jackery Solar Generators. While gas generators did the job, they were loud, cumbersome, and disruptive. When his truck broke down on the side of the road or winter ice storms cut power at home, the generator was a noisy, messy solution.

Jackery changed that. He keeps a compact unit in his truck. "This is the one I'll bring in the fall when my truck shuts down," he thumps the generator with pride. Leslie has built a small ecosystem of portable power at home. To him, at first, the quiet operation mattered most. "It's quiet. You don't hear it. It's eco-friendly." Those two facts alone made the difference between a stop that felt like a crisis and a stop that felt manageable.

Storms and Grid Failures

Life in Farmington brings unpredictable weather. Leslie has seen windstorms, heavy rain, ice storms, and spring tornadoes roll through with little to no warning. Each one puts stress on the power grid, and outages are common. “You hear about power grids going down all the time. When it goes, it goes,” he says.

As a veteran living with PTSD, Leslie depends on routine and steady noise to keep him grounded. “I can’t handle any noise. I gotta have a fan running, I gotta have a TV running. If you take that away from me… it triggers me,” he explains. For him, Jackery is more than backup power. It is part of his stability. So when storms hit and the grid fails, his Jackery units keep the lights, fan, and TV on, ensuring his household stays steady while neighbors wait in the dark.

When Power Means Medicine and Stability

Health emergencies can shake even the strongest people to their core. Leslie has had to be a rock for his wife, who has faced three open-heart surgeries, a stroke in 2022, and a ruptured spleen in 2024.

During hospital stays and the uncertain days at home, Leslie often found himself searching for something to hold onto. “I know them inside and out. Jackery has saved my life in a lot of ways… it kept me busy. It kept me from just working out and crying all the time with my old wife lying in the hospital,” he admits.

When it came to her care at home, reliable power became a quiet lifeline. As he recalls, “She was on her medication, and we had the power with Jackery to keep that power and keep her healthier.” That simple ability to preserve medications and run small medical devices transformed stress into stability. For Leslie, Jackery was more than an appliance: it was a safeguard for his family.

Building a Home System Without Permanence

“I have to run cables because I can’t run it to the house since I’m a renter,” Leslie says, talking about how he has to set up his backup system. Since he does not have connections to the grid, Leslie needed a setup that would give him the benefits of home backup without rewiring or permits. Over time, he assembled multiple Jackery Solar Generators, including small, portable ones for everyday use and larger home battery backups with expansion batteries to handle heavier loads.

Leslie's solution was a plug-and-play approach. He has a Jackery Solar Generator 2000 Plus with five add-on battery packs and a Jackery Solar Generator 1000 Plus with six add-on battery packs. “I just plug them into this outlet right here. You can do this, and you don’t have to have permits to run the Jackery plug-and-play. I’m not plugged into the grid whatsoever or the house,” he explains proudly.

The arrangement lets him stay independent and avoids the permanence (and paperwork) of traditional installations.

Leslie also appreciates the controllability of his system. While on the road, sometimes hundreds of miles away, he can check and control his units through the Jackery app. "Along the road, 600 miles away, I can control my Jackeries with the Jackery app," he says. That remote access means he can monitor usage, start charging, and rest easier even when he's far from home.

Learning, Gaming, and Family Time

Power also opened space for new things. Leslie uses a Jackery Solar Generator to run his video game setup. He says, “I definitely consider myself a geek,” he admits. “I wasn’t into football. I was a band geek… I’m guilty.” At 56, he plays video games with his granddaughter, a small joy that brings them closer and sharpens hand‑eye coordination in ways he values.

He also uses his Jackery Solar Generators at family outings: picnics, park days, and side‑by‑side rides at a nearby state park. "It's very nice to bring your Jackery anywhere that you need a power source," he says. For Leslie, power is a portable convenience as much as it is a backup. It is a way to gather family around music, games, or a hot pot of coffee without hauling cords and noisy equipment.

Savings on Electricity Bills

There was an unexpected financial benefit to Leslie's setup. By shifting everyday loads onto solar-assisted, portable power, his household electric bills fell dramatically. “We were just having $303, $350 bills,” he recalls. “I own these Jackerys, so I’m pulling the cord through the house. Why? Because I need to save money. Our bills have dropped from $300 down to barely over $100 a month.”

More Than Backup

For Leslie, Jackery became a source of solace when it was rare. When his wife lay in the hospital and the future felt uncertain, building and understanding his portable power system gave him a task to learn and a reason to keep going. He taught himself the products, the charging math, and the practical skills of running cables and stacking batteries. "Jackery has saved my life in a lot of ways," he says.

The Comfort of Independence

Leslie's story is not dramatic in the cinematic sense. There are no daring rescues or storms. Instead, it is a story of steady, practical resilience: a way of turning a complicated life into something manageable through portable power. For a man who spends most of his weeks on the road, that manageability is everything.

Power, for Leslie, is peace. It is certain that medication will keep running, that a TV can teach and entertain, that a game can be played with a granddaughter, and that a truck breakdown becomes just an inconvenience instead of a disaster. "Even if I'm not gonna be home, I feel peace thanks to Jackery," he says.

In the end, portable power didn't just keep lights on. It kept Leslie present for the people who matter most.