It was hungry out and I had to find something to eat.

I was driving to work in Santa Ana from Yorba Linda. It was Christmas Day, and I was looking forward to the overtime check for working on a holiday. We lived okay, weren't struggling or anything, but the Covid pandemic had changed so many things. At work I looked like either a member of Planet of the Apes or a scrub nurse, with my mask.

Work wasn't hard. I had an okay job, working in an office, a behind the scenes worker in an industrial supply company. Paper, paper, paper. That's what I shuffled except of course most of the "paper" was digital and mostly viewed on computer monitors or tablets or phones. It was boring at times, but when you know what to do you can sometimes just suspend your thinking and do it. I usually daydreamed, often about fishing.

But first, let me catch you up.

My name is Raul and my wife Rosalie and I have two kids, a 15 year old girl and 13 year old boy. We live in a small house with a tiny yard in a suburb of Los Angeles. Rosalie and I both work. My drive is about an hour each way and her's is 40 minutes. She has a good job as a supervisor at a local retail store. Me, I'm an office manager.

Our kids are into their teenage years and are easily bored, getting a bit rebellious, and, I'm guessing, tempted to get into trouble. On this Christmas Day our son Jeremy was going out with some friends to just hang out and do what teenage kids do. Rosalyn was spending the day with her best friend at her house.

It was a typical day, except that it was the most major holiday of the year when many companies shut down for a week or more. My employer gave office workers the option of working for overtime on all holidays and that helped pay for our Christmas expenses.

The Christmas holiday itself doesn't mean much to me anymore - it is just a big moneymaker for merchants, and a big money drag for families. For the last several years our presents came from Amazon or rarely from a local store. I was numb to Christmas. Another day. Rosalie tried to decorate the house a little, she had me put up a string of lights at the front of the house, and we got a tree, but there was no magic in the day. It was just a day like a lot of others.

For the last four years, on Christmas day Rosalie goes to mass, I go in to work, and the kids are on their own for several hours.

When Christmas becomes meaningless, when it loses its magic, then life takes on a monotonous tedium. One foot in front of the other. Plodding along. Smiles, sure. Hugs, sometimes. But emotion? Magic? Not now. Our one true family time used to be vacations when we would go camping at state parks. But not now. Our kids would rather stay home and hang out with their friends. This past summer, with the pandemic and a surge of infections happening, Rosalie and I decided to take our respective vacations and work on the house. Boring...

Oh, there was a time when the kids were young that Christmas was special. There was the early, early morning rite of having the kids wake us up so they could see what Santa brought. Sitting around the tree with hot chocolate and cinnamon rolls, passing around wrapped boxes. Watching the kids' eyes as they opened their gifts accompanied by squeals and bright smiles.

"Christmas is just for young kids," I thought. As you get older it just becomes a ritual. No thinking. No special words. Not even any music. Just numbness, going through the motions. There was generally great relief every Christmas night as Rosalie and I gratefully sat drinking wine, happy to have this event over with for another year. As the kids got older the joy, the laughter, the magic of Christmas slowly faded.

The 91 is a ribbon that connects various places in the LA basin. But for me, it's a monotonous, sometimes anxious commute with accidents, bumper-to-bumper travel and frequent total standstills, all courtesy of the up to 200,000 cars that travel it each day.

Christmas Day is different. My commute drops from one hour to about 30 minutes. I can leave later and still get to work in plenty of time. The only traffic on this day are families traveling to visit friends and family for the holiday, but of course, they generally aren't on the road until I'm safely at work.

On this day I didn't have time for much, having gotten up just a bit late due to a late night with hot buttered rum and Rosalie, relaxing and looking at the Christmas tree that seemed like a pathetic, scraggly shadow of the trees we used to spend hours decorating when our kids were young.

Took a quick shower and headed out the door, not even a cup of coffee for the road.

Within minutes I was on the 91 freeway, the on-ramp being practically empty. Cruising speed on this freeway in the absence of cars is around 70, but today it felt better to just take my time at 60. Probably irritated a few people, but hey, I was in the right lane.

It was the usual holiday morning light traffic. No one seemed to pay attention to me in the slow lane. I was kind of driving by remote control, no thinking, daydreaming, mind wandering in a bunch of different directions.

The 91 where I get on is just a typical southern California ribbon of concrete. Like most in the heart of LA land, it's pitted, cracked, patched and repatched. There's a certain rhythm to driving on concrete freeways. If they're grooved for better traction in heavy rain, they sound one way, if they're not they have regular places where the concrete roadbed can expand in heat. Bump, bump, bump. It's mesmerizing and added to the sheer monotony of my drive I was sailing along with no way to tell you where I was at any given time.

Traffic in the worst of times is like going to a party. Everyone's moving throughout the party but you seem to be around the same people for quite a while. Same on an LA freeway. But on a holiday there's more room to maneuver, one of southern California's finest driving traditions. And, much of the time you can actually see down the freeway a ways looking down the lane dividers.

I had in my mind a problem that had been evading any resolution. My brother is a good man, but he really torqued me off this time. He had been spending a lot of time in casinos, and I know he's not able to handle financial loss. I tried to talk to him, but he said he doesn't want to talk about it. That was a month ago at a family dinner. I walked away and haven't talked to him since. What the heck, Sal? It was back nagging me again.

I sensed more than heard something, it sounded loud but muffled by some distance. I regained my focus on the road and as I looked ahead I could see what looked like a cloud of dust rising from what must be the road, about 200 yards away. I put my foot near the brake pedal and tried to steer just a bit more to the left to see down the lane divider. It was small but growing and it looked like a fire in the road, but it was a distance away and the only way I could be sure at all was because I could now see smoke. I applied some pressure on the brake to alert anyone behind me. And because the cars ahead of me were coming to a slow stop.

This is the most dangerous part of LA freeways, not moving, being stopped. It's not a huge problem if you're in the middle of a traffic jam. The problem occurs either as you approach a deadstop jam, or when you are the last car in your lane to arrive at the jam.

Fortunately, the car behind me was slowing with me and when I came to a stop, she did also. Traffic started to creep forward. First one lane, and then a different one, a few car lengths at a time. We were close to being able to see what had happened. And then we were driving past some car parts along the road. Finally, we came to two cars stopped in the middle of the road, one smoking from the engine area and the other seriously damaged in the rear. Cars were passing the wreckage like a huge zipper, expanding to alternate lanes before shifting back to their original lane after passing the mess.

I was just about past when I spotted two people standing alongside the road, right at the wreck site. I couldn't believe it but standing there was the guy that cleans the office where I work. He looked troubled and the guy he was talking to looked really angry. I was in the shoulder lane so I pulled off the road past the men and parked. Walked back to where they were standing and stood quietly while they talked until they stopped and one of them called out, "Hey, Raul. Is that you, man?"

"Yeah, Binh. What happened. Do you need any help?"

"This guy was stopped and I didn't notice. It happened so fast. I hit the back of his car and then my car started smoking. I think it's on fire. Do you have a fire extinguisher, or could you find one?"

"Yeah, I have one in my car. I'll get it."

So, we put out the small smoldering fire in his engine with my fire extinguisher and I asked him if he needed a ride.

He did and after the tow trucks came and the police wrapped up their report, he climbed into my car and we buckled up for the road.

By this time, my stomach was growling. "Hey, Binh. You hungry?"

"I could eat just almost anything, book, car part, anything."

"I spotted a sandwich place that's just about two exits ahead. Let's get some lunch."

It wasn't a fancy place. I mean, it was a sandwich place, you know? But the cool thing about it was it wasn’t one of those torpedo places where you shift along like a kid at the school cafeteria, answering questions and selecting food elements. You sit down at this place and they actually provide table service. Not your typical, fast food, drive through, anyhoo.

So, we're sitting there, got our water, about to look around for the wait person, and we hear an argument. It was just conversation and then it became yelling. I looked around to see someone, maybe the manager, shouting and waving his arms at another man. The guy looked a little shabby, but this isn't the ritziest of neighborhoods, so there you go. He might have been your typical person walking on the sidewalk.

The argument was pretty one-sided. The maybe manager was saying something like "You come in here and use the toilet. You're dirty. You just use the toilet. I told you the last time, you're not a customer."

Not sure what got into me, but I stood up and walked up to the maybe manager and said, "Actually, he's with me." And then I looked at the man, winked, and said,"C'mon, we've been waiting for you."

Well, that's sure not like me. As I walked back to the table I turned around to see my new lunch friend turn sideways and walk past the scene of the argument.

"Thanks. I sure don't want to bother you," said Mr. Disheveled.

"No problem. Were you coming here to eat?" I asked.

"Not hardly. I don't have any money to buy food here but I do need to clean up from time to time. So, I've been coming here off and on to go to their restroom and kind of wash up. I try to leave the place cleaner than I found it, but I guess the management here doesn't care or doesn't notice."

Binh shocked me by saying, "Hey, I've got your lunch. Here's the menu. Pick out what you'd like to eat."

And I thought Binh was a skinflint.

We all ordered and, as we were eating our sandwiches, our lunch compatriot shared a little of his story.

"I got laid off when the pandemic started, was able to live for a while on unemployment and some stimulus money, but eventually the money started to dry up. I got rid of what little I had, moved out of the apartment and into a motel room that I could rent by the week, then stayed in a men's shelter for a while, but it's hit or miss if you can get a bed there some nights, and anyways, the shelter has no shower facilities. There's a church that offers free showers but it's about two miles away, and I have arthritis in my ankles so bad I can't walk far.

My sandwich was roast beef with horseradish, on a toasted whole wheat roll, with all the extra stuff except onions and peppers.

"If I had a little money I could take the bus, but then I wouldn't have anything to eat. So, I take a chance that some of these local businesses will maybe understand what it's like, and just show me a courtesy."

I swallow hard. It seems like life could have gone that way for me. My stomach is grinding and my mouth is dry. My sandwich has gone cold.

A second later he adds, "Sometimes it works and sometimes you wear out your welcome. I guess this place is the latter."

I really like the sandwich but it's starting to turn in my stomach as he says those words.

My mind started to work. "Are you able to work. What did you do to earn money?"

I don't know what got into me, but I promised to meet Mr. Disheveled on the next weekday after the holiday and take him to a place that has clothing to help those in need, and especially business casual attire. I think, "We'll get him some clothes and then go to the employment division to see what kind of work they have." In the meantime, I tell him, he can come home and stay with us, that I'll pick him up after I finish work today.

Mr. Disheveled looks incredulous for a few moments and then he smiles when a well-dressed woman walks up to the table.

After "Excuse me," she asks me and Binh if we know who this guy is.

We say "Sort of, we just met."

She tells us his name is John Henry Parker III, he's a wealthy philanthropist and this is his hobby, an elaborate ruse to find and reward good people, people that do things for others out of human kindness. He and his team use sandwich shops and other locations to identify the local hero of the day. When he finds that person, he gives the benefactor a gift of $1 million.

And then she gave me a cashier's check for $1 million while Mr. Parker smiles!

My sandwich ended up costing me $10.99 plus tax but it gave me one million dollars in return, of which I gave $50,000 to Binh, making his accident just an inconvenience.

Now that incredible Christmas sandwich tasted like pure gold.

And, this was the last Christmas holiday I ever worked.