The Angel In The Dumpster

I can still remember as if it were yesterday, that cold and bitter Alaskan December morning I woke up to discover a homeless man frozen to death on my front porch. I could see plainly, his tears frozen to his cheeks and I remember being very distraught thinking to myself, 'if only he had just knocked on my door, he would've found a warm meal, hot shower, and comfy bed and he would've survived with a new outlook on how his life still meant something to someone...'

My wife noticed the pain this caused me and she said to me, "if this bothers you so much, then get angry enough to do something about it..." Little had I known then just how completely my beautiful wife had changed my heart. She taught me how to have a completely selfless sense of humanity, from which we started an enormous outreach to our homeless community handing out survival packs with hats, coats, gloves, sleeping bags, coffee cards, soups, etc.. and we handed them out to hundreds of people on some very cold nights.

One day, I was pumping my gas and I heard a waman shouting some very vile words towards a young man eating out of a trashcan. I stepped in and pulled the kid out, then proceeded to take him out for lunch. After lunch I invited him Into a vacant apartment of ours and he agreed to work for me for $20hr, free rent, and learn a trade. I taught him all about textiles and flooring.

A month into our arrangement I learned that he had lied about his age, and that he was only 14... This really hurt my heart just as much as the man who froze on my porch. So I decided to find his parents. Once I found them, I learned he had been homeless since he was 12, and his parents were terrible people who eventually agreed to sign custody over to me for $50. However, I had a child of my own on the way and couldn't care for this kid like he needed so I found him a perfect home through a local church...

Fast forward now from 2007 to August of last year... I found myself at rock bottom, losing our businesses, relocating to a point we just finally started building our lives back, and now with 2 daughters ages 3 and 4... And I was laying across my wife's chest holding her as tight as I possibly could... Listening to her heart beat, and screaming at the top of my lungs, "Jesus Christ! Wake the fuck up please!"

My wife of 12 years, my best friend, mother to our baby girls, was allowed a heartbeat via machines. And the doctors all told me she was gone, but I didn't believe them. My wife was an organ donor, and for a whole week I laid with her screaming for her to prove the professionals all wrong and come back to me, just waiting for her donor recipients to be ready for their gift of life she would soon grant them.

And when they took my love through the double doors, knowing that would be the last time I'd see her, I was completely empty and ready to give up... And I was close to it when my phone rang... And I'll never forget how that phone call changed my life, saved my life, and kept my faith... It was the boy we saved in 2007.

Turns out, my wife contacted him a week before she passed away because she wanted me to hear it from him just exactly what I had done for his life, in hopes that it would give me strength to keep pushing forward in our own personal fight. And when he learned she had just died, he prayed with me, then told me that I gave him a family, who gave him an education... And he said because of me, he owned a textile business in Seattle, had a beautiful wife and kids, and he said that was all owed to me... And then he paid for my wife's funeral costs...

Before this point, I'd long given up on people and the belief that I could change the world. And in the end when I needed it the most, down on my knees cursing God... The evidence of my seemingly small actions became apparent and reminded me that, I'm a different breed. And that I have, and still can keep making a real difference even through all my pain and grief.. and it's been a life saver for my kids and i lately.

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