Redbeard carries a backpack and a sacred calling

I once saw Redbeard riding his skateboard along Otay Lakes Road. It was close to midnight, there were only a few cars on the road, and the light from the streetlamps was dim. As he snaked his way down the slope, hands in his pocket, moving toward the Sweetwater Valley —where he sleeps against the wall of the Circle K, or holds his signs along the 805 exit for spare change or spreads the good news to the people of the jungle — I thought of a verse he once shared with me, a Psalm of promises from God:

• For He shall give His angels charge over you,
• To keep you in all your ways.
• In their hands they shall bear you up,
• Lest you dash your foot against a stone.
• You shall tread upon the lion and the cobra,
• The young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot.

When I first met Redbeard he was sitting still on a patch of grass, legs outstretched, under the shade of a large clump of bamboo-like Arundo donax, alongside a drainage ditch next to the southbound 805 freeway exit onto Bonita Road. He was wearing True Religion jeans and an orange-and-red plaid shirt over a tie-dye T-shirt. Tied loosely around his neck was a rainbow-patterned tie, on his hands black fingerless gloves, and a red, white, and yellow headband covered his forehead. His long red hair and red beard, from which he gets his moniker, are merely accessories to his costume. “I dress this way to get attention. Then, they can hear my message.”

A few hours earlier on the same day, Redbeard got the attention of law-enforcement officers. He was walking slowly along Plaza Bonita Road. He hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep the night before on the rocky ground behind the Home Depot in Imperial Beach. He’s an insomniac, and drinking two two-liter bottles of Mountain Dew did not help. He was heading to one of the four hideouts he has across the county where he stores his things — sometimes he hid his things under a bush, beneath a freeway bridge, or lodged deep inside a dumpster. He had a guitar, a green satchel, a Bible, and a folded cardboard sign with a thick Sharpie inscription: “The only thing powerful enough to change an enemy to a friend: love. #GodisLove.”

As Redbeard made his way to his things, two sheriff’s department SUVs pulled up next to him, flashing their lights. The doors of one of the SUVs swung open and two officers walked up to Redbeard. The other cruiser drove off.

“This time, we have probable cause,” one of the officers said. “I know last time you were talking about probable cause. This time we have it.”

“Probable cause for what?” Redbeard asked, taking off his sunglasses that covered his red, drooping eyes.

“We got a call that you are dealing crystal meth around here,” one of the officers said.

Redbeard assured the officers that none of it was true. He was clean and he was sure of it. To back his case, Redbeard would have said that he has never touched the drug, let alone dealt it, but that would be a lie.

It would be a lie because of that night during his Navy days, more than a decade ago, after partying in Tijuana. He was stumbling back into his Chula Vista apartment when his neighbor offered him crystal meth, and he smoked it for the first time. What began as a wild ending to a wild night became an addiction, and to feed that addiction Redbeard kept going back to his neighbor who eventually ran out of the drug. But Redbeard pressured the neighbor for more, which got Redbeard stabbed in the hand with a knife, blood spilling onto his white T-shirt. The doctors aboard the USS Constellation gave him a drug test while treating his wound. To avoid the consequences of testing positive for meth, Redbeard fled the ship and went AWOL.

He never touched the drug again. That is, until that winter night in Montana, when Redbeard, heartbroken from a cheating girlfriend, locked himself inside his trailer — no running water or electricity. The only light came from the amber flame that lit his glass pipe. Redbeard, who had experience as a mountaineer, was ready to pack his things, head out into the cold Montana wilderness, and survive for as long as he could. But with the help of his father, he admitted himself into a rehab facility in Seattle, and he fought the addiction and won.

When Redbeard re-entered the world, things happened fast. He met a woman in Seattle through Craigslist who had two children from a previous marriage, married the woman, moved to Colorado, had two more kids, developed bipolar behavior, was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, found a new addiction in alcohol, and drank 1.5 liters of vodka a day. His marriage eroded. Redbeard ran, returned to his family, then ran and never went back. He took a train to St. Paul, Minnesota, to visit a brother dying of cancer. Redbeard crumbled into the streets of St. Paul, where he found meth once again. But this type of meth was different. It lacked ephedrine, a component of meth that keeps people awake for days. Without the ephedrine, the meth calmed Redbeard as he battled his ADHD, bipolar disorder, and insomnia. The meth helped him think clearly, allowing him to complete his thoughts and to find something that was rare for Redbeard: rest. He would use the drug as often as he could. Until one night while resting, Redbeard, who grew up in the church as the child of a Lutheran pastor, had a vision.

In the clouds of heaven, Redbeard says, he saw God the Son pointing at him, and the Son told God the Father, “We can send Redbeard.” God the Father said, “Fine, but he has to clean up his act.” Redbeard awoke with a purpose. The Minnesota winter was setting in, so last December, he boarded a bus to San Diego, where he had a history. He carried with him a backpack and a sacred calling: bring the gospel to the homeless.