Nature Boy

“True story. Paul was a familiar character in the Okanagan Valley of British Columbia in the 1970′s.  I saw him many times walking the highway between the lakes.  One day I gave him a ride.”

See the man walking down the highway.
He wears only ragged shorts and worn-out shoes.
His hair is long and stringy,
His skin is like leather, beaten by the sun over many summers.
He walks the highway from one end of the lake to the other.
A common sight on any day, he is known as Nature Boy,
But his real name is Paul.
Sometimes he looks old, sometimes young,
Most times ageless.
No one knows where he came from.
Some say he is a millionaire
Who lost his family in an accident.
Now he walks the highway and sleeps by the tracks.

One day I offered him a ride.
He looked into my window,
A scared child, apprehensive, untrusting.
“Paul’, I tried to assure him, “It’s okay.
It’s okay, Paul”.
Hearing the sound of his name,
He relaxed some, and climbed in.
We rode in silence, he, very still, barely moving.
I did not ask him how far he was going,
He didn’t tell me; he didn’t have to.
I had watched him each day,
I knew his routine.
I stopped at the place where he always left the road,
He climbed out, saying nothing,
And watched as I drove away.

He was found by the railroad tracks.
Some say he died in his sleep,
No one really knows.
He was just a character, a curiosity.
But for me he was a person, a brother, a friend.
We had shared a brief moment in time,
In silence, but still we had shared a moment.
I had looked into his eyes; I had seen his soul.
To this day it haunts me.
Who was Nature Boy?
Who really was Paul?

by David Ronald Bruce Pekrul