A CLASSIC TALE: First meeting Thomas

February 10, 2008 - Sunday

A Great Patrol Current mood: accomplished Hi People! I was almost beginning to feel like a fake. My "other life" responsibilities had taken high demands on my time and I wasn't able to suit up for over a week. Yesterday I finally got a chance. I started out taking bags of aluminum cans to the Ronald McDonald house's can-drive. I met the McNeillus trash haulers and a nice kid from Ronald McDonald House named Alphnonso. I went inside, met the weekend staff and gave them a copy of the City Pages that they might want to share with the kids. One of the staff asked if I might want to visit with the kids someday and I said of course. I told them that I have a myspace page and they can reach me through that. It started snowing. Of course it did. It's frickin' Minnesota... I went on patrol, looking at some of the high-crime areas, based on Josh Paternik's rochestercrime.org site maps. From one end of the city to another... nothing. The snow became heavy and nearly white-out. I was coming up from Highway 52 onto south Broadway when I spotted a guy holding a cardboard sign near Menards. "Homeless. Hungry. Need a ride." I swung through Burger King, got a bag of food and some hot coffee - no cold drinks in cold weather this time. Live and learn. I parked and brought him the food on foot. He thanked me, of course and tucked it in his pack. He liked the hot coffee a lot. His name was Thomas. We talked for a while about his situation and his options. I'm not sure how many people watched us talk along the busy highway. Maybe one of those people might have seen the City Pages article and said, "Hey, that guy is actually real!" That's what I so selfishly needed lately. To feel real. I wanted to be a do-er and not a pretender. I've been dealing with book deals, radio interviews and documentaries lately. Fame will make you doubt yourself and your if you don't keep up the pace and be REAL. ________ Thomas was such a kind and gentle man. With sad eyes. He said he was living under a bridge not far away. The temperature was in the 20s. He thought he would have a place to stay if he could get there, but it was a long ways away. I offered to take him, but we had to pick up his other pack from the bridge first. I put the heat on high in my vehicle for him. We went to the bridge and while he picked up his pack, I called a hotel where I have connections to try to get him a free room. My contact wasn't there at the time, so that didn't work out. As I took him to his destination, we had a good talk. He's been "on the road" for ten years. He has health problems, but is able to do light carpentry or maintenance. If I can find him again, I might have a lead for him. He thanked me genuinely and profusely. I can't tell you the profound experience it was. He was such a nice and gentle man. Not an alcoholic and not deranged. Just in a bad circumstance and without a plan. After leaving him where he wanted to be (with a few other extra items), I was on my way home. I saw a truck stalled at the side of the road. I stopped, introduced myself and asked how I could help. Their battery was dead and they asked if I had jumper cables. Damn, why didn't I consider that as part of my standard gear?! There's a tip for us northern heroes... It never occurred to me. But I'll get some. The guy was really good-natured and said that they had a tow-truck on the way, anyway. So I felt pretty good about that, even though I couldn't actually help them. It was meeting Alphonso and Thomas that made the patrol so worthwhile. I feel privileged to have met them and I want to try to follow up on helping them in any way. I think I did some good. Geist out.