text: It was about dark outside, around that magic hour. Everything that moved seemed like it was a silhouette being blotted out by the purple sky. The sunsets in Arizona are simply stunning. I was standing at the back gate where the wall meets the narrow alley where the dump trucks come down to pick up the trash. It's hard to believe the trucks could fit through that alley. Even where I'm standing just outside my gate, I would probably be crushed under those tires. I had two bags of trash in my hand. One was for the recycling and one was for the regular trash. I had been standing there in a daze, looking at that sunset for so long I forgot which bag was for what. I snapped out of it and took the fifty-fifty chance putting them in their respective bins. I mean who really puts everything in the recycle? they were likely mixed anyway. With all due respect to the environment. I always wonder how they separate all that stuff on the back-end. I can't even imagine. Sum it up to job security for the waste management industry. As for the environment is concerned, that ship has sailed, and sank. I'm standing in the middle of the alley and I can hear the sound of something far behind me moving through the gravel coming closer. I'm still looking at the sky while I can, after all, it will only last twenty minutes or so, and I'm in no rush. Im taking deep breaths enjoying the beautiful sky and the beautiful fall weather. I turn and walk back towards our gate in the alley when I see an older man stopped in front of me on his four-wheeled electric scooter and the old man looks up and gives me a cheek to cheek grin, missing teeth and all. It looked like he was on oxygen because he had those tubes in his nose. I suddenly hear the screech and rumbling of a diesel engine turning the blind corner a bit too fast into the alley. That old man was a goner. I didn't even try to save him, I took a dive like superman through my gateway. I landed in the grass in my yard starring back as the truck did it's business and moved on diligently through the alley. I jumped off my feet and ran out to the alley and saw no traces of the old man. Prepared for the worst, I looked for what I might expect to be the flattened and bloody remains of the old man who gave me that grin. It was like he was never there. That smile though, it was just his smile I remember amongst his degrading state. It felt like I was on drugs after that. It was like I couldn't feel pain. I felt energized and aware like this was a dream, but apparently, I was not aware enough to realize I was seeing some ghost. It's a miracle I even got out of the way of that truck, all I could think about was that old man. All I could think about was that old man and his electric scooter on the brink of death, but almost literally smiling in the face of death. I will never forget that grin, real or not. For all this time I was under the impression that my eyes were wide open. It was as if suddenly I was shot into the sun and forever I would go, my eyes blinded by its light. A world came to focus around me, slowly but surely. I was in a bed with some bandages on my body and head. There were tubes coming from my arms. A bit of pain began to focus my reality. seems the drugs were wearing off. I could not figure out how I got to the hospital or what had happened. I looked down, and at my bedside there he was, the old man in his electric scooter. He told me that I pushed him through the gate without second thought and saved his life. I'd been In a coma for 2 weeks and he's been praying by my side since the day it happened. He told me I was a hero. He gave me that same exact grin, and told me that it was the stupidest thing he had ever seen someone do for another person." you should've let me die." he said. I smiled back, and told him, "everybody get's a second chance, even if it's your last.