The Guiding Hand of God

 ***UPDATE***

I recently found out more information about my wayward passenger back in June.  I've thought about Charles and my short time with him quite a bit since I met him. Always wondering how and where he ended up, and if he was ok. A few days later, I had the bright idea to look him up on whitepages.com; and there was a man with his name listed in Maineville. His address was literally 400 ft from where I found him. Doh!  My day and Charles' could have been a lot quicker if I'd just done that one simple thing. But as I said in the article below, that was not God's plan. 

This was not just a simple pickup-and-rescue operation in His eyes. I fully believe that He was showing me, and others involved, that to help others is to help yourself, as well. 

So, I would stop by his house during the course of my route; it took a while for me to be there when someone was home, but eventually a lady answered the door. I asked her if a Charles Reed lived here. She said yes. I showed her the picture on my phone and asked if this was him. At this point, she put two and two together and realized that I was the one that found him. She shook my hand and said thank you so much. I assume she is Charles' daughter but she never actually told me that. She told me that the police said UPS found him lol. Oh well, that probably helps me in the long run. 😉  Charles is 84 years old, and suffers from dementia. She told me that as a child he lived on Lincoln Avenue down in Cincinnati's Walnut Hills neighborhood. She said that she had never heard his wine bar story before and that made her laugh a little. Her daughter was mowing the lawn when he took off on his adventure. He is currently at the Cincinnati VA awaiting a more permanent placement. Over the three years that Charles has lived with her, he has become increasingly more difficult to care for at home and she is making the tough decision to put him in a place where he can get the proper full-time care that he needs. God bless you Charles, may the ones who care for you be kind and gentle, and have the ears to hear and the eyes to see as God wants them to. 

  The Guiding Hand of God by Eric Power 

     God puts us where he needs us to be at that exact moment. We may not realize it at the time, but I believe this to be absolutely true. A hundred alternate decisions could have been made differently to put me in a place other than where I was at 4 pm this past Thursday. I could've been slower and finished my route later; I could have done the Regency Subdivision (affectionately referred to as the H's, because all of the streets begin with the letter H) before the Village on the Green neighborhood above it, which I had considered doing. At the end of my route, I could have exited the subdivision from one of the other two access points. Had any of those things been slightly different, I never would have crossed paths with Charles. But Charles needed a helping hand; so God nudged me here, and prodded me there, steering me this way when I really wanted to go that way. This is how I ended up meeting and assisting the elderly Army Vietnam Vet. 

My Time With Charles

I surreptitiously snapped a photo of Charles while we were
waiting for the mysterious van to appear

I pulled over as I saw him, and before I even thought about it, I was hopping out the door. This, too, is rather unlike me, as I am not a very impulsive guy. Usually I ponder things to death before acting. Sometimes this is to my advantage; other times it causes the moment to pass, and I miss an opportunity. I asked him how he was doing. He was walking with a hefty looking suitcase that was probably about as old as he was. He would move the suitcase forward and put it down; then he would walk with his cane about 2 steps and then repeat the process. It was agonizingly slow and it just broke my heart watching him. I'd never seen him before today, and he definitely stuck out, wearing his jacket with a shirt underneath and his pajama bottoms and fuzzy house shoes. All this in high-humidity 80°+ Ohio weather. I asked him if he needed some help with his suitcase; he replied that that would be fine, because his back was hurting him terribly. I asked him where he was headed, and he told me he was meeting his sister at "the wine bar on Gilbert". This seemed odd to me, since the only Gilbert I know is near downtown Cincinnati. He said he lived on Lincoln (another street near Gilbert Ave) but he couldn't tell me which town he lived in. He seemed somewhat disoriented and not sure how he came to be in Maineville. So I offered him a ride up the street to see if we could find the "wine bar". In truth, I was heading towards an urgent care facility in the area that I thought could probably give some assistance. 

This is where things took a strange detour. As I pulled into their parking lot, a man in a car pulled up and asked if I was the one who was helping the elderly gentleman out. Surprised, I said I was, to which he replied that the Warren County Community Services van was looking for him. Whoops. Apparently I screwed up somebody's day by picking up their rider. The guy said he would call the driver and let him know where I was; he would meet me and pick Charles up from there. Awesome, right? My mystery jump-seat rider had some back story after all. So, Charles and I waited, and waited and...well, we waited some more. We passed the time with some chitchat; I asked him about his Vietnam Veterans hat that he was wearing. That's when I discovered that he was in the Army over in 'Nam. I thanked him for his service and told him about my dad, who was in the Army fighting the same war. I asked him if he was thirsty. He said he was; luckily, I had stopped at Kroger and bought a 32-pack of bottled water earlier that day - yet one more thing that I was planning to do at another time. I pulled one out of my cooler for him. He guzzled it down pretty fast!  I'd imagine that walking in the heat really took it out of him. 

At this point, maybe a half an hour after my conversation with the guy who was calling the WCCS van for me, there was still no sign of my relief pitcher. I decided to call the WCCS to see what was going on. According to Doty, they didn't have a van in that area at that time. Apparently they didn't even have any record of my passenger!  So now what? And who was that guy talking about?!? She wondered if he was homeless; I told her that I didn't think that he was. Even though he said he didn't live in town, my suspicion was that he did and just couldn't remember the fact. They suggested that I call the police to see if they could help. Before doing so, I asked Charles if he was okay with that idea; in his altered state, I didn't want him freaking out if the cops showed up. I've had some experience with people suffering from dementia, and that was an issue for them. He said that was fine with him. After calling and telling the Hamilton Township official my story over the phone, she told me that I could wait for an officer to meet me, or I could just drive him there myself. Well I'd had enough of waiting for people to show up, and since my last two stops of the day were right across from the station, I figured that it was better to just go to them. Also, I thought it might be better for his mental state to not ride in the police cruiser. I was still worried about how he might react to the police. He may have said it was okay right then, but when they showed up, the whole situation could have changed. So we drove down the street to the station, helped Charles and his suitcase out of my truck, (he had some trouble navigating my steps) checked in at the desk, and waited in the lobby. A few minutes later, a friendly officer came out and she began talking with him, also getting very little usable information from him. At this point, it seemed that my time with Charles had come to a close. I talked to the officer for a few minutes, telling her of my experience with him and giving her my contact information in case they needed to follow up with me. I shook Charles's hand, said that it was an honor meeting him and told him to take care of himself. He smiled and said thank you. I finished my last stops and my 4 o'clock day was finally finished at 6 o'clock. And I'd do it all again if it happened the same way. 

Reflections

Lately, things have been such a grind. Work is so crazy-busy, we've been trying to buy a car, moving, replacing our water heater that's been broken for some time,and all of the other craziness of day-to-day life, etc. etc. etc. ad infinitum. Throw in the darkness and doubt that goes through your head at any given moment - do I measure up, am I a good enough husband/father, can I hold it all together?? - and this can lead to a pretty rough week. They say when you're going through Hell, you just keep on going and don't look back. Good advice, indeed. But sometimes, I forget that I should look up and around every now and then. As you trudge down your own path, others nearby might be going through their own private Hell; maybe, if you give a helping hand, you can both get out of Hell together a little bit sooner. With that realization, I think Charles helped me that day as much as I helped him. 

Then again, was it Charles or myself who needed the help that God wanted to be given?  Maybe it was Doty, who strangely answered the phone a half hour after closing time, on her way out the door, who seemed absolutely astounded that I went out of my way for this stranger. What struggle is she coping with in her life? Maybe the help was for the officer who came out to meet us. Someone who sees the worst in humanity on a daily basis, and needed a refresher by seeing someone helping his fellow man for no personal gain. We may never know the wide reaching effects our actions may have, no matter how simple we think they may be. To slightly misquote U2, "He moves, in mysterious ways."

As for Charles, I hope and pray that they are able to find his home or family, if he has any. If nothing else, I hope I provided some respite from the heat in my truck. My thoughts and prayers are with you Charles. Godspeed, my friend. Thank you for reading this account of my personal story, and God bless. 

Galations 6:2

2 Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.