The burrito man and other helpers

Abraham Villarreal
3 min readJun 19, 2022
Tortillas and eggs were always accepted by the burrito man on Saturday mornings. Photo by Sergio Contreras on Unsplash.

On Saturday mornings, in the town I used to live in, there was a man that set up a big disco in a parking lot, under a large tree. It was early in the mornings during winter, just as the sun was coming up over the mountains at the edge of town and the steam could be seen rising from his coffee cup.

I don’t remember his name but he was the burrito man. His disco, a propane tank, and a long white table were all he needed to cook up delicious breakfast burritos. Those of us that knew what he was doing would drop off tortillas or eggs, just to have a reason to say hello and to feed off of his constant enthusiasm.

I learned about him from Cheryl, one of the lunch visitors at the soup kitchen. She said that the burrito man was going to start setting up in a couple of weeks. Winter was coming and somehow or the other everyone knew the burrito man was going to be there.

In every community there are helpers. Helpers known by everyone and at the same time not known by anyone. All the people that need to know them, know them. The rest of us are oblivious to what they are doing, how they are helping.

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Abraham Villarreal
Abraham Villarreal

Written by Abraham Villarreal

People are interesting. I write about them and what makes them interesting.