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Eddie Adelman is a writer who lives in Belfast. His book of columns and short essays is called “Don’t Get Me Started.”
I did a lot of hitchhiking in my youth. If you recall, hitchhikers were a fairly common sight back in the 1960s and ’70s.
I had a real desire to see the country up close. I was also hungry to learn about life. And hitchhiking was a crash course on both those topics.
There were so many rides from so many kind strangers. If I learned nothing else from that experience, it was the rule of “pay it forward,” which I figure is a close cousin to “The Golden Rule.”
A truly memorable ride occurred in 1972 on a trip from California to New York. I was headed home for Thanksgiving.
I made a bet with myself that I could thumb my way cross-country in under 72 hours. If I pulled it off, I was expecting a full-page spread in Ripley’s Believe It or Not!
I was doing great until I got stuck outside of Reno, Nevada, for about three hours in the middle of the night. I figured the bet was lost.
But then, around 2 a.m., a car stopped to pick me up. It was a serviceman on leave for five days. He was headed home to Kansas to propose to his girlfriend. Needless to say, he was in a hurry. My stock was suddenly rising.
We took turns at the wheel, as we booked it straight through the desert, the Rockies and the Great Plains. It was nothing but pit stops and coffee refills.
Long story short? Thirty hours later, I was dropped off in Lawrence, Kansas. And I actually made it home in just under 71 hours. As I reflect back now, it was the coolest Thanksgiving ever — except for one.
In 1985, I was living in Portland. My girlfriend and I were preparing a quiet Thanksgiving dinner just for us. As soon as the bird was in the oven, we made a quick trip to the convenience store to pick up some last-minute food items.
On the way to the store, we saw a young man with a duffle bag. He was hitchhiking right in the middle of town, something I’d never seen before in Portland. I instinctively picked him up, having no idea where he was going or coming from.
Turns out, he was headed home to Lewiston. He had hitchhiked the last few days from Alabama where he was just kicking around, doing odd jobs.
He’d had a falling out with his father a few years earlier, and they were now estranged. His sister called him recently to tell him their father had taken ill. It was serious. That was the reason this young man was coming home. To mend fences.
Instead of dropping him off at the Interstate 295 on ramp in Portland, we decided to drive him all the way to his front door in Lewiston.
When we finally dropped him off he didn’t need to say the words, “thank you.” There are times when words aren’t necessary. The grateful expression on his face was all the thanks we needed. It’s a smile I’ll never forget.
He invited us into his home, but we declined. After all, we had our own bird in the oven. And we prayed we didn’t set the apartment on fire while doing a good deed.
After dropping him off, I should have pulled away immediately. But I couldn’t help myself. I tarried for a moment to watch the young man’s mother greet him at the door. It was a Hallmark moment, all right.
So, if you see someone in need of a ride this Thanksgiving, think about stopping. That wayfaring stranger might not be the boogeyman after all. Like so many of us, he might just be trying to get home. And it’s a golden opportunity for you to pay it forward — to give thanks.
Happy Thanksgiving to one and all — even the least among us.
