We weren’t friends per se. But I knew him.
I don’t know how it started. I’d wake up in the mornings, hop in the truck, and drive to a nearby gas station. I’d buy a newspaper. A weak cup of joe.
The old guy was usually there. Waiting outside the gas station, smoking a cigarette.
He looked ancient. Bushy gray beard—stained orange from tobacco. His face was painted with a thousand wrinkles. His shoes were falling apart.
He carried a backpack the size of a Buick, which usually sat at his feet. He had a little dog with him named Rufus.
“Rufus is a purebred,” he’d always say. “Heinz 57 breed.”
“In the afternoon,” said the gas-station cashier, “he always asked customers for handouts, but never in the mornings. I don’t know why he didn't ask for handouts in the mornings.”
I do. Because he was hungover.
“Either way, someone always bought him a cup of coffee,” the cashier went on. “And if someone didn’t, we’d let him have as much free coffee as he wanted.”
His name changed each time we talked. Once, he was
Jerry. Another time, he was Ron. He’d been Apollo, James, Ricky, you name it. Who knows what his name was.
He’d talk about anything. He’d cuss politicians. Talk about this current generation’s selfish ways. He’d talk of Vietnam. Then, inevitably, he’d usually talk about God.
God was one of his go-to subjects. I guess you get to know God pretty well when you’re homeless.
Sometimes, he’d preach a little. And his sermons always came off flat because of the gin on his breath. Still, I’d give him plenty of Amens, and then I’d wish him a good day. And he’d always—always—God bless me.
Whereupon he’d heft his backpack onto his frail back, and set off for heaven only knows where.
Sometimes I’d see him on the side of the road, walking steadily onward. Through…