Who was that man?

The other day a man stopped in to the church office while I was eating my lunch.

"You look like you're enjoying that sandwich."

"I am."

"You are lucky to have it."

"Yes, I am grateful for it."

He asked to use the phone and I said yes. I am oftentimes wary of people who come in asking for such favors. Sometimes, they can overstay their welcomes, or make me feel uncomfortable. But this man gave off a very calm, friendly feeling. He was a middle-aged African-American, wearing a knit cap over grayish white dreadlocks. He said he needed to use the phone, to help a friend of his get a phone installed, which seemed like an effort in keeping with our ministry. As he called the phone company, I could not help overhearing as he spoke in reasonable tones, gathering information for his friend, an older woman in Amherst. I realized that part of the reason I trusted him was because he spoke with an educated accent.

He told me afterwards that he was passing through. He always visited this lady on his way from Nantucket, where he lived, to Montpelier, where he had been invited to design a solar powered library. "How interesting," I said, and then he told me that the last time he was in our church, he had been visiting James Baldwin, who had been a visiting professor at the University at Pixieville. Having once been a denizen of the halls of the Englishland, I vaguely remembered having seen some posters dating to that era and knew he had spent some time here. He went on about how some other famous person found him and Baldwin talking and he said "oh, of course you know each other." I knew this to be shameless name dropping, but interesting nevertheless. I'm a sucker for famous writer stories. The man went on his way, and I expected not to see him again.

A day or two later, out of the corner of my eye, while driving through the grocery parking lot, I saw a homeless man moving large boxes towards some undeveloped land. I couldn't really see who it was, since I was in motion.

But then, the next day, I saw him again. Hard to miss him: he was wearing bright yellow pants, and that knit cap. It was the same man. How strange. Is he just a crazy homeless person? Is this how he travels from Nantucket to Montpelier? Is he really a solar architect? Whose reality is this?