Homeless man returns engagement ring

Started by Martok, February 18, 2013, 05:43:01 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Print
Go Down Pages1
User actions

Martok

February 18, 2013, 05:43:01 AM
For those who could use a feel-good story today: 


Quote
Last week, Sarah Darling of Kansas City, Mo., left more than a little change behind when she dropped a donation in a homeless man's cup.

The cup belonged to Billy Ray Harris, 55, who had been sitting in his regular spot on the sidewalk. He didn't notice that Darling had accidentally dropped her engagement ring in with the change until he packed up for the day.

"When I finally decided to leave I got on my bike and dumped the change into my hand and there was the ring," Harris told NBC's Michelle Franzen.

Harris thought that the ring, a diamond and platinum sparkler, was a fake. Then he had it appraised.

"It was really worth some money," Harris said. "Worth enough that he was ready to give me four grand right there on the spot." Harris thought of taking the money, but said that his grandfather raised him to be honest. He knew in his heart he couldn't take the money.

"I am not trying to say that I am no saint, but I am no devil either," he said.

Darling realized a day later that the ring was gone. She immediately returned to Harris' usual spot, and he was there waiting - with her ring.

"It was just such a feeling of loss when it was gone," she told Harris. "I am eternally grateful to you."

"Like we need an excuse to drink to anything..." - Banzai_Cat
"I like to think of it not as an excuse but more like Pavlovian Response." - Sir Slash

"At our ages, they all look like jailbait." - mirth

"If we had lines here that would have crossed all of them. For the 1,077,986th time." - Gusington

"Government is so expensive that it should at least be entertaining." - airboy

"As long as there's bacon, everything will be all right." - Toonces

TheCommandTent

#1
February 18, 2013, 08:38:03 AM
Nice to hear things like this still happen.
"No wants, no needs, we weren't meant for that, none of us.  Man stagnates if he has no ambition, no desire to be more than he is."

Bison

#2
February 18, 2013, 09:15:26 AM
I hope she gave him a good reward.

Greybriar

#3
February 18, 2013, 09:53:57 AM
According to the Daily News, "....Darling rewarded Harris with all the cash she was carrying in her wallet...."

It says a lot about someone as down on their luck as that man--a homeless beggar who sleeps under a bridge. He is a better person than many millionaires are.
Regardless of how good a PC game may be it will always have its detractors and no matter how bad a PC game may be it will always have its fans.

LongBlade

#4
February 18, 2013, 10:48:38 AM
Somehow I'm not surprised this happened in a place like KC. Good for him. While we could use some saints, I'll be happy to have a lack of devils.
All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

Longdan

#5
February 18, 2013, 11:20:15 AM
Sounds like she didn't need it.
digni enim sunt interdicunt

Boggit

#6
March 01, 2013, 07:43:32 PM
Nice guy. If what goes around comes around, this guy is due for a lucky break. :)
The most shocking fact about war is that its victims and its instruments are individual human beings, and that these individual beings are condemned by the monstrous conventions of politics to murder or be murdered in quarrels not their own. Aldous Huxley

Foul Temptress! (Mirth replying to Gus) ;)

On a good day, our legislature has the prestige of a drunk urinating on a wall at 4am and getting most of it on his shoe. On a good day  ::) Steelgrave

It's kind of silly to investigate whether or not a Clinton is lying. That's sort of like investigating why the sky is blue. Banzai_Cat

bayonetbrant

#7
March 01, 2013, 09:08:23 PM
apparently they've set up a fund where they're taking donations for the guy and have collected like $85k or so
The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

Martok

#8
March 02, 2013, 11:47:34 AM
^  Very cool. 

"Like we need an excuse to drink to anything..." - Banzai_Cat
"I like to think of it not as an excuse but more like Pavlovian Response." - Sir Slash

"At our ages, they all look like jailbait." - mirth

"If we had lines here that would have crossed all of them. For the 1,077,986th time." - Gusington

"Government is so expensive that it should at least be entertaining." - airboy

"As long as there's bacon, everything will be all right." - Toonces

Longdan

#9
March 02, 2013, 12:03:37 PM
It is like getting a medal....GET NOTICED!  GET YOUR 15 MINUTES!
digni enim sunt interdicunt

LongBlade

#10
March 02, 2013, 12:09:31 PM
Quote from: Longdan on March 02, 2013, 12:03:37 PM
It is like getting a medal....GET NOTICED!  GET YOUR 15 MINUTES!

Dude, you get noticed for 15 minutes every day here. What else do ya want?
All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

Longdan

#11
March 02, 2013, 12:13:44 PM
It satisfies my every need.  Except there are no real girls here.
You know what I mean..GET NOTICED, get on youtube, somebody will collect money for
your whateveritis.  Get insulted on a school bus..just get noticed.
digni enim sunt interdicunt

Martok

#12
March 06, 2013, 04:05:28 PM
A follow-up to the original story.  Nice to see the guy have something good happen to him for his honesty & kindness. 


Quote
When Kansas City homeless man Billy Ray Harris returned Sarah Darling's engagement ring last month after she accidentally dropped it in his cup, it could have been the end of the story.

Instead, the experience has changed his life.

In the weeks since his good deed went viral, Harris has gained national attention, and supporters have raised over $175,000 for him to find a new home.

Something even more valuable happened: Harris is back in touch with his family, from whom he was estranged for the last 16 years.

Amid the media storm around the engagement ring episode, Robin Harris, Billy Ray's younger sister, happened to come across an article about her brother, and reached out to the local news station that first reported the story for help tracking him down.

"When I turned my head, I recognized the name, and I turned back around and I looked at the picture again, and it was my brother," Robin told TODAY.com. "I called and I said, 'that's my brother. I've been looking for him for 16 years.'"

Robin, who still lives in Texas where the family grew up, said she made repeated efforts to find her brother over the years, but had heard varying reports about his whereabouts, and was even once told that he had died.

When she was finally able to connect with him on the phone last month, the siblings had a long and emotional conversation to catch up on the last decade and a half.

"It was nice. I was crying," she said. "I was happy to hear from my brother. I told him I just couldn't believe he stayed homeless for so long when he knew he could come back. I would always give my brother a place to stay."

The two now talk on the phone almost daily, and Robin has helped him get back in touch with their three other siblings, as well as his numerous nieces and nephews — some of whom he didn't even know existed.

"It felt great," Harris told TODAY.com of what it was like to hear his sister's voice on the other end of the line. "I hadn't talked to her in so many years. I was totally excited and surprised."

He says he never stopped thinking about his family, though he had assumed he wouldn't see them again. "I'd been worried sick about my family since the last time I saw them," he said. "I totally lost contact with them back in the 90's...I was kind of down in the dumps, and on the verge of giving up."

Now doing some work as a roadie for a local jazz band, Harris is no longer sleeping on the street. He's been staying in the basement of one of the band members, and is getting his identification documents straightened out so that he can open a bank account to access the donations people have raised for him. He hopes to use the funds to buy an apartment and fly back to Texas to see his family.

"We're thinking about having a family reunion in July, so definitely then, but I intend to be there before that," he said.

Robin can't wait to see her brother, and hopes he'll consider moving in with her. "I just want him to come home," she said. "He told me he would, but he didn't want to be a burden on me. He didn't want to come if he couldn't help me."

As for the woman whose ring he returned, Darling says she and her husband Bill Krejci have become close to Harris, and hope to stay in touch with him in the long run. Krejci, who launched the donations page for Harris, regularly has dinner with him and has been helping him navigate the paperwork to get his life back in order.

"If he goes back to Texas it will be harder, but I would like to stay in contact every once in a while and check in with him," Darling told TODAY.com.

While all the attention has been a little exhausting, Harris says he's excited about what the future holds, and thankful the experience has led him back to his siblings.

"That's the main thing," he said. "To me, that's the best thing to come out of this whole deal."

"Like we need an excuse to drink to anything..." - Banzai_Cat
"I like to think of it not as an excuse but more like Pavlovian Response." - Sir Slash

"At our ages, they all look like jailbait." - mirth

"If we had lines here that would have crossed all of them. For the 1,077,986th time." - Gusington

"Government is so expensive that it should at least be entertaining." - airboy

"As long as there's bacon, everything will be all right." - Toonces
Print
Go Up Pages1
User actions