America’s Newest Revolution

By

Mary E. Gale

At 5'7", 142 lbs., and 80 years of age the straight-backed beggar could be somebody’s grandfather. And he is.

But at a West Palm Beach intersection this balding, sweating "Grandpa" is shuffling from car to car at 3 PM on an egg-frying July day. The sign he holds in front of his sun-damaged skin makes me look twice.

"SIGN, 80 years old, Social security not enough, Don’t Smoke or Drink, Please Help, Need rent and medication, Thank you, God Bless."

I lean out my car window and yell above the roar of the traffic, "Would you share your story with me over dinner at the restaurant behind us? I’ll buy."

A few moments later when George chomps down on a tender T-bone steak, I notice bottom teeth missing. That’s not his main problem, though. The red in George’s intense hazel eyes tells its own tale. This aged panhandler is going blind from glaucoma and dry macular degeneration in both eyes. The degeneration is worse in the left eye. This is an incurable affliction.

Though the blistering Florida sun has splotched his face in skin cancers, the old man peppers his story telling with "People are so wonderful. God bless them."

Between bites of vegetables and sips of coke, George reveals the misfortune that led him to this not-so-easy life of begging for handouts.

In Seattle 17-year-old George joins the Merchant Marines. He has no medical benefits through the armed forces because the Merchant Marines are not part of the US military. Instead, ship owners hire unarmed merchant marines to run their ships and carry military supplies. To get medical benefits a Merchant Marine veteran must pay a monthly fee.

Illinois: 1949. After marrying his sweetheart, George and his wife raise their four sons and two daughters. He makes a pretty good living from 1960-69 working in maintenance for a Johnson outboard motor dealership in Rockford, Illinois.

Colon cancer kills his wife in 1975. He marries again but this union lasts a brief six months.

While employed at Rick’s Wonderland--a recreational vehicle and snow equipment dealership--George gets a lucky break. A customer invites him to move to the warm, coastal town of Key Largo to maintain the man’s fleet of boats and outboard motors. Eventually, George buys the rental portion of the boat business. During the mid-seventies, he is a high roller who owns fourteen boats of varying sizes. These include two house boats. At the same time he converts a U.S. mail truck into a very successful mobile service for repairing outboard motors at clients’ docks.

Eventually, though, the long hours and stress take their toll. Exhausted, he sells all his boats and outboard service and settles 30 miles north in Homestead. He meets a lady who paints computerized pictures on T-shirts for a living. While living off his savings from the business he accompanies her to a Daytona Beach mall near Zayres. Here he buys a 15-foot travel trailer. He sleeps in front and sells custom car tags out of the back. A customer asks George to make a tag "Would the last American leaving Miami turn out the lights?" He cannot fit the last portion in so George improvises with "...please bring the flag." A while later the man comes back and shows George a picture of that license plate printed in Time magazine. George says Paul Harvey talked about this unique tag on his radio show.

Even though George has less stress, his white blood cell count shoots from 10 up to 60 indicating ulcers or other causes. He has two ulcers. So he gives up the lady and the car tag business.

This next move takes him to Miami and a maintenance/security job at a Tropic Gas International office that bustles with 70 some white-collar workers.

George owns a 1979 Ford Granada at this time. He sits pretty until the day an uninsured motorist rear-ends him and totals his one-year-old car. Two herniated spinal disks, tendinitis, and arthritis costs him the job: he can no longer mow the building’s lawn.

Sometime later George accepts a less physically taxing job managing/maintaining a 39-unit apartment complex. Unfortunately, his bosses are unmarried yet living as a couple. They argue so often that they finally sell off all the apartments--including his. Another lucky break comes when the new buyer writes a condition into the contract that George stay on and manage the 39 units. This lasts until the building is sold to another man who raises the rent above what George can afford.

In 2004, 79-year-old George pulls a 12-foot Shasta trailer from a flea market in Kentucky to Palm Beach County. He forks over $100 a week to park the tiny home.

Although George gets $657 in Social Security retirement, the day comes when he can’t pay the lot rent. He gets desperate. He approaches some street people and asks for suggestions. Later, he fills out paper work for food stamps, but human resources claim he qualifies for only $10 a month. He says, "Keep your old $10." He stalks out of the office.

The street people tell George to call Senior Hot Line 211. Senior Hot Line suggests he call HUD for an apartment. Goodwill offers a bed and some passers-by help George furnish the apartment.

By now, George, too, is a street person.

One lady, Millie, says to George, "‘You look like a nice guy.’ She lets me in to help at a church where I gave out 200 dinners and cakes and cookies. Snaps, with the number of people in the family on them, were given out to families who came to eat. I took the snaps when serving people so the food was accounted for and families couldn’t return for seconds. I got a basket of food for doing this."

Another woman sees him on the street, stops her car and asks, "Are you hungry?" She offers him the 25 hamburgers she has just bought. "I gave some out to neighbors and ate the rest. A soda truck stopped one time and offered me two cold drinks, and once a gal came out from Burger King and asked if I could cash checks. I said ‘yes’ and she wrote out one for fifty dollars. While I was working outside a doctor’s office a gal handed me $30 and offered to buy me Nexium for my ulcers. She gave me a bag with a new pair of jeans and other clothes."

George C. has Humana insurance rather than Medicare because he can’t pay the co-payment or deductible. A minimum of $700 goes out each month, not counting food, gas, or car upkeep. He maintains a 1993 Buick Century for his transportation. It gets him around town and to the doctors.

I lean forward and ask the question that burns in my mind. "You’re somebody’s father and grandfather. Isn’t family supposed to help family?"

For a moment he looks down at his empty plate then answers slowly, "One son in the Air Force at San Diego sent for me to come live with him. I stayed there from 1983 to1990. Then my daughter took me, allowing me to park my trailer on her property until she was asked to pay $50 a day in fines.

"None of the kids makes a decent living and I won’t be a burden on them."

Is 80-year-old George part of America’s newest revolution? You tell me.