On a warm summer evening, a body
came flying out of a rolling boxcar. The body rolled a couple times,
then went head over heels about twice, then laid still. I was standing
in Seattle Light cable reel yard, behind a steel cyclone, fence, when
I witnessed the Hobo jumping.
The Hobo sat up, but did not move until the caboose went by.
The Hobo got up on his hands and knees and crawled across three sets
of railroad tracks, before he stood up. There was a patch of tall
dusty grass, about twenty feet past the last set of tracks. He stood
there a minute, looking at the patch, then threw his blanket bedroll
down, and started walking down the track. I picked up my lunch sack
from the laid over cable reel, and started walking parallel to the
Hobo. I wanted to see what he was going to do.
I had to stop at the end of the fence, but the Hobo continued
down the tracks, picking up old newspapers and cardboard boxes. When
he had his arms full, he turned and started walking back. I got back
to the laid over reel, and sat down. I watch the Hobo put together a
shelter made out of the materials he had gathered. Once done, the Hobo
laid out his blanket bedroll.
I yelled, "Do you want a sandwich and a apple?" my voice
startled him, but he yelled back "yes". Then he asked me to keep
talking, so he could locate me by my voice. When he got to the
railroad tracks, he got down on his hands and knees, and crawled
across the three sets of tracks. He ended up, about twenty feet to my
right. I told him to follow the fence up to me.
When the Hobo got within four feet of the fence, he stopped. I
could see he was scared of my uniform. I told him I was not a
policeman, but a security guard. I could see his eyes; they were ash
white, due to cataracts. I told him to step back, I had to throw the
lunch sack over the fence.
The sack landed about ten feet to his left, he turned, and he
must have heard the sack hit the ground. I gave him direction to the
sack, when he picked the sack up, he said "Thanks" then walked over to
the tracks, and got down on his hands and knees again.
After fact: I went back to my rounds of the cable reel yard, but I
kept thinking about the Hobo. I just knew one day he would jump out of
a boxcar and he would never know what killed him.
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