Tony James stood holding a cardboard sign on the street corner, caught in the cold drizzle.

Damp clothes. Sun-beaten skin. Moving around to keep from shivering.

Nobody really paid attention to Tony. Motorists sped around him. Most refusing to roll down windows. Avoiding eye contact.

Tony had become urban wallpaper. Almost invisible to civilized eyes. You see Tonys all the time. Standing at a stoplight. Asking for handouts. Most drivers just keep driving. Some might catch a glimpse of the little cardboard sign as they whiz past, which usually says something like, “God bless,” or “anything helps,” or “thank you.”

Tony’s sign read: “VETERAN.”

Tony James is a 44-year-old Navy vet. Tall and lean. Nice smile. This last year has been hard.

First, his appendix burst. The surgery was supposed to be straightforward, but there were complications. Mounting medical debts drained his bank account.

Then, Tony and his girlfriend lost their house and moved into their car with both of their pets: One medium-sized dog, named Elvis, and one 250-pound pot-bellied hog named Roscoe. It was only supposed to be temporary. Just until they figured something out.

One month later, Tony’s girlfriend of 13 years died of a heart attack.

“When it rains it pours,” says Tony. “I’d like to think I got broad shoulders and I can handle things, but…” Tony pinches the bridge of his nose and sniffs.

So Tony was alone. Living in his car. With his dog. And his pig.

Roscoe the hog is about the size of a General Electric residential appliance, with coarse bristles on his back, and thick tusks growing outward from his upper jaw. Feeding a pig the size of a college draft-pick linebacker isn’t cheap. But Roscoe isn’t just a pig. Roscoe is Tony’s baby.

“My wife adopted Roscoe when he was just a piglet,” says Tony. “He’s like our son. I’d never let anything happen to him.”

And so it was, each night Tony would fall asleep, parked in some back alley, or moored in some big-box-store parking lot. A little frightened—there are a lot of dangerous people out there. A little despondent, because, well, how was he going to pull himself out of this? This was going to be some kind of Christmas.

Last week, one afternoon, everything changes. It happened when a few guys from Portland Fire & Rescue’s Community Health Outreach Program were driving around downtown. They found Tony on the corner. Sign in his hands.

They pulled over.

“I was trying to get dog food and gas for the car,” says Tony. “They stopped, rolled down the window, and asked me what my situation was. [They] were willing to listen to me, and they were the only people that even opened an ear to hear me. I’m so thankful for it.”

The Fire & Rescue guys wanted to help.

“We just don’t know why people are in the situations they’re in,” says paramedic Aaron Botteron.

So, they got in touch with Tony’s family, in Chicago, who agreed to let Tony live with him. The Fire & Rescue guys bought Tony and his dog a plane ticket home. There was, however, one small problem.

Roscoe would have to stay behind.

The Fire and Rescue guys found a pig sanctuary in Linn County, willing to adopt Roscoe. It’s a nice place. Roscoe will live in the country with a hundred other pigs. There are even places for Roscoe to wallow in the mud—Roscoe has never wallowed before.

Keep in mind, however, this is the same animal Tony has raised from infanthood. The same little piglet he and his girlfriend used to cradle to sleep in their arms. The same animal who has been his only lifeline to any semblance of sanity throughout a long stretch of despair and homelessness.

When he got the news that he would have to say goodbye to Roscoe, Tony hugged his hog, buried his face into the thick flesh of Roscoe’s neck, and wept.

“There’s going to be a lot of tears,” Tony says. “I just hope Roscoe doesn’t—I mean, he’s like my child. But [at least] I’ve got tonight to spend with him.”

By the time you read these words, Tony and his dog will be on a plane, bound for Chicago, about to start a new adventure. By the time you read these words, Roscoe will be wallowing in a glorious pile of mud.

You might wonder why I’m telling you all this. I’m telling you this for an important reason.

Namely, because you just can’t fit all that onto a cardboard sign.