i was perhaps three or four years old when i encountered a man in the park directly across the street from our home in buffalo, new york.

childhood memories rarely preserve themselves with the fidelity of a recording. mine arrive in fragments, isolated images that have somehow survived the passage of time while much of the surrounding experience has disappeared.

but i remember his shopping cart.

it had wheel covers attached to it, and in my imagination, those otherwise ordinary pieces transformed the cart into something magnificent. it looked like a fast race car, and i was fascinated.

i also remember him telling me he was hungry.

i told him we had food at our house. my mother was always cooking, and home was just across the street, so the solution seemed perfectly obvious to me.

i took him by the finger and led him there.

his hands seemed enormous compared with mine. i can still recall how my little hand could barely wrap around a single finger as we walked together from the park toward our house.

much of what happened afterward comes from my mother’s recollection, which she shared with me decades later.

she remembers looking out from the kitchen and discovering her young son sitting on the back porch with a man she’d never met. when she asked who he was, i explained that i’d promised him something to eat.

i then asked my father whether he had any clothing he no longer wore. rather than simply offering the man a change of clothes, my father heated water so he could wash. my mother prepared a meal, and together they gave him clothing and a little bag of food to take with him.

according to my mother, before leaving, the man told my parents that i had an old soul, that i would take care of people, and that they should look after me.

she also recalls another occasion when i brought home a woman who needed assistance. my parents again provided food, clothing, and an opportunity to wash. my mother remembers that although the woman didn’t necessarily look different afterward, she seemed to feel better.

laughing as she recounted those experiences, my mother described me as the son who brought home people instead of pets.

my father, understandably, worried about my safety. yet despite his reservations, he helped the people i brought home. whatever instinct had prompted me to invite them into our lives became something tangible because my parents were willing to respond.

at that age, i understood nothing of homelessness, poverty, social services, or the complicated circumstances that can leave someone without a stable place to live.

i simply saw a man with an extraordinary shopping cart. he told me he was hungry, and i knew where there was food.

i couldn’t have imagined how much of my adult life would eventually become devoted to making that connection easier.

but that afternoon, there was no grand philosophy, no elaborate plan, and no expectation of anything in return.

just a hungry stranger, a little boy holding his finger, and a family willing to make room.