I wonder where he is?

I used to work at a local archival library in town. We were open to the general public and our collection consisted of local historical materials and documents. I worked there for 3 years and I got to know a lot of the regulars. Some were local historians who were researching books or planning tours around town. We also had meeting rooms and I met a lot of interesting groups that I had never heard of before. Some of our regulars were homeless people who used the internet. Most of them of were very nice and personable and I always wondered how and why they ended up living on the streets and using our bathrooms as a shower. Occasionally, we had mentally ill street people that came in and were harassing or disruptive. One crapped all over the mens bathroom and was enjoying fingerpainting with his own scat. Fun. That sucked and we had to call security and housekeeping. We also had a transvestite patron, who was technically male but unsuccessfully looked female. She used the girls bathroom a lot but she was pretty tame so I didn't care. Overall, we had scary to very nice folks come in. In libraries you pretty much have to set the place on fire, pee in a corner or start tearing pages out of a book to get thrown out. Lately, I have been thinking of one patron in particular named Al. He was a homeless kid who grew up in Houston and traveled to Austin. He used our internet but I never knew what he was looking at. I realized that the majority of the homeless were either activists doing research but mostly were looking at porn. I know this because they would open up a gazillion pages of porn and lock up the computer. I closed a couple of windows and I saw some great views of labia before I said fuck it and just rebooted the damn thing. I have those parts so I don't need to see no stinking pictures. Anyways, Al came in every other day for a year. He was photographer and was always trying to get me to buy his pictures and as you know as a library employee, I don't get paid shit, so I couldn't buy his pictures. He kept coming in and then one day he disappeared . Three months later he returned. He had returned to Houston and sold everything he owned including his most prize possession, his camera. I could tell he was pretty low and I told him to hang in there. A month later he disappeared again. I admit, I was worried. He came back the following month and he had changed. Before he was wearing tattered, dirty clothing and barely showered or shaved. Working in a library makes a person resistant to the BO smell. Now he was wearing a buttoned up shirt with a black tie and slacks. He looked so professional. I asked how it was going. He told me he started working for a temp agency and the company liked him so much he got a permanent job at a printing company. I was happy for him. Out of all the homeless that came in, he changed for the better and you don't see that often. He still came in occasionally to use the internet but intermittently. One day, it was raining cats and dogs outside. A lady walks in and you can clearly see that she is soaking wet and homeless. She asks if we have a tarp and we unfortunately didn't. That must have been the straw that broke the camel's back because she lost it. She started screaming and yelling at me on how she needs help and nobody will help her. I stated that we were a library and don't carry such equipment but if she needed help that we could direct her to some social services to help her out. I probably shouldn't have said anything because she laid into me again, on how I was a horrible person because I wouldn't help her, I think she wanted money and was working the guilt trip because I was obviously doing well if I was working and I had some money to spare. Yeah that made me laugh, too. Al noticed that I was getting yelled at and the whole library could hear this woman ranting at me, so he came over and inquired what was going on. She realized that here was a new person who could possibly help her and she goes through a list of what she needs. He listens to her patiently and nodded every once in a while. When she finally stopped, he replies, "Sounds like you need a job." My jaw dropped. Out of all the people who I figured would be the most sympathetic to her plight, it would be him. He told her that he was once homeless and that he was able to turn his life around and if he could do it so could she. Then he chided her for her feeling of entitlement. He told her to work to get what she wants and to not expect a handout. I looked at her face and it was as if all the wind was sucked out of her sails and seeing that she wasn't going to win the argument or get anything for free, she left. I thanked Al and he said no prob, he was just tired of hearing excuses and that he knew that if a person wants to turn their life around they can do it because that's what he did. I was so proud of him and to this day he is one of my own personal heroes but he doesn't know it. I wish I could have told him before he stopped coming to the library. I guess he bought his own computer or moved on but I remember him fondly and I hope that he is doing well.