Last Friday I happened to be driving back up the mountain around lunchtime. When I got to the top, right at our road, I saw something I have never seen around here before — a backpacker. He had just crossed the top of the mountain from Little Texas Valley and was starting down Fouche Gap Road towards the bottom on the other side. I slowed down to make my turn, so I got a pretty good look at him. He was a middle-aged man with a large backpack. I assumed that maybe he had been camping somewhere in the forest. There are certainly a lot of places where you could do that.

I mentioned it to Leah after I got home, and then I forgot about it. Later in the evening we went down to a fast food place to get some chicken. We stopped at the store on the way back home, so we went home by a different route from the one we took into town. There we passed a man standing stooped over with his hands on his legs and a huge pack on his back. As we passed I realized it was the same backpacker I had seen on the mountain. We turned around and went back to make sure he was OK.

It turned out he was fine. He was just resting his back and shoulders. We asked where he was headed. He said a nearby convenience store to get a little something to eat. So we offered him a ride and he accepted.

At the convenience store we talked a little. We asked if he would prefer to eat somewhere else and he said he would. So we ended up taking him into town to eat at a Steak ’n Shake,* a hamburger joint that stays open 24 hours. 

Tim was his name. He had spent the morning hiking from a lakeside campground down in Texas Valley. I estimated that to be at least six miles from the top of the mountain, and I later got an actual distance that was a little more than that. He had spent all morning hiking up to the top of the mountain, and the rest of the day hiking down to where we found him. I measured that distance with the car trip meter. It was also a little over six miles. That was a 13-mile hike with a big pack on a very hot, sunny day.

Tim used to live in Rome, and his daughter still does. He had visited her for some time, and than set off to somewhere else. We asked where he was headed, but he was indefinite about it. All he was concerned with was where he would spend the night. He said he had several options in town because he knew several people from when he lived here. He also mentioned a homeless shelter.

He said he had had trouble with drugs in the past but was clean now. He told us he had worked in a lot of different fields, from mechanical work to healthcare. He said he had come from South Carolina, but we never got a straight answer on exactly how he had reached Rome, by foot or some other way.

He was a 43-year-old free spirit. Whether he was free by choice or necessity was never clear.

When he got out of the car he offered to let me get a feel for his pack. It was far heavier than any pack I ever hauled in my backpacking, and it was not a particularly good pack.

We gave him some money so he could have as big a dinner as he wanted. He seemed to need some help, but he never asked. That’s one reason I volunteered a little donation. He later texted us a photo of his Steak ’n Shake dinner, so we know he actually spent the money there.

We asked him let us know how he was doing, but he hasn’t contacted us since the hamburger dinner photo.

It’s hard to know exactly what to make of Tim. He seemed like a genuinely nice guy, and we’re happy we helped him out. He was a little old to still be trying to find out who he is, but I guess we all start on that job at different times.

For all we know he could have been an axe murder on the run. But he didn’t murder us, so we’re happy about that, too.

* Despite needing two apostrophes, Steak ’n Shake uses only one.