By Bob Allen
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Gone to Heaven
— Excerpt —
“The [Roland Park] building was terribly deteriorated – probably the most dangerous place I’d ever set foot in. Parts of the second floor of the house had caved in and fallen through to the basement. It was dirty, disgusting work. Basically, every day was spent digging debris and garbage, the grossest stuff imaginable, in this cold, damp building with no windows. I’d be so cold at the end of the day it would take me the entire ride home to Sykesville just to start to get warm.
“As I drove home, I’d go through some Baltimore neighborhoods that were sad. I’d see these little 3- and 4-year-old kids out wandering the streets in T-shirts in the middle of the winter without parents or siblings. I mean, I’m dirty, with soot all over me, and I’m seeing this – he shakes his head gloomily – and the whole world, in my mind, is like this sad, sorry place.
“Then I drove across the bridge, past the old train station, into Sykesville, and it was like another world. He pauses, grins. The town was having its Christmas open house. I see all these people walking around, all these Christmas lights and carolers and Santa Claus. I was transformed into this Norman Rockwell painting. I thought, ‘My God, I’ve died and gone to heaven.’”
— End of Excerpt —