February 08th, 2012

Donald Brandt 's Story

Birth Year: 1949




Table of Contents





     My name is Donald Brandt...


    [Pic]


    People call me by my name High Plains Drifter. I was born in Rockford, Illinois on New Years Eve 1949. I am a Capricorn!


    I finished High School but I did not go to College. I went right into the Air Force where my job was handling supplies corp. I loaded and unloaded supplies.


    Back in 72 I had a CB handle known as High Plains Drifter when I was working on the sailboat. I am not homeless! I am Houseless! My home is all outdoors. It is a beautiful home I have. It's also my church. I got my love for the outdoors from the Boy Scouts. I hold them to blame for where I am at today. I was in the scouts for about 3 years. I became a first class scout. I got the badges with everything on it. What I liked most about it was going camping. They trained me to be perfectly comfortable in the outdoors.


    I still carry with me the reminders of Boulder County tickets for camping someone got the idea that we shouldn't sleep where they don't want us too. As if it is a real problem? I got 7 of them over 5 years. They came to $700.00. Boy these folks can't take a joke.


    My father is still alive today though I don't get along with him. We just never got along. He was never a real father at all. My mother who I did get along with has past on now.


    I have 3 sisters and one brother. My older sister is a retired schoolteacher and second oldest sister she is married again and a bar tender; well I don't know what she does. My younger sister is a president of a Pacific Working Union. She has been President 4 times. She got elected four times. I am very, very proud of her. My brother's named Dale Brandt. I have a picture of him in my daypack. He looked like he was 17 at the age of 36.


    I have never been married but I was close to it. There was this lady I asked to marry me once. Her name was Debbie Lake in Key West back in 1977. I met her at the hospital. I was working there on a weld crew and the guys wanted to go to the hospital to eat. They boil the food there. I was asked one day to go to the hospital to help out my sister who was a dietician there. This was before she was a teacher. I remember I had a chocolate milk and a brownie. I was walking out when I met her. I just took a chance. She suggested that we just live together.


    I still carry a picture of Debbie with me today. Debbie was the most beautiful woman I'd seen. She was a lady of the evening and an exotic dancer on the weekends as one of her other jobs. She never worked the streets but had a 6 inch address book that when she wanted to make some extra money she would call someone and the money was always there. She was a high-class woman and charged about $100. I asked her to marry me but she just said lets just live together. And it was a good thing we didn't get married.


    I was jealous for a while but then she set me straight. This is what I do and if you don't like it don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out." She said to me. I sort of cleaned that up a bit!


    It took a day or two, but I sat down and thought about it and she was right. I don't own her and she don't own me. That just jumped off my back. If she wanted to do it that's ok with me, it's the oldest profession in the world. Back before Christ. That is what he was trying to teach. Just be nice to each other. It didn't take to long to get over the idea that she didn't belonged to me. She was right. It was her body and she could do what she wanted with it.


    We rented a place one street off Duval. It was an apartment in a conch house. It is a style of house. It was facing south on the 900 block one street north of Duval. It had it's own balcony overlooking the street. Rent was about $275 per month.


    I took her one time to Walt Disney World. We stayed in a hotel suite with a kitchen and an upstairs bedroom in the building. It was like a house but a hotel. We flew up in an aeroplane for the weekend. We missed our flight back. So we took the bus home. We still had a great time. We had a bottle of asti spumontie Martini and Rossi, a wine and two glasses. We sat in the back of the bus. We had some cheese popped the top and had a blast.


    I was with her over 6 months. I have not had anyone special like her since then. Usually on the weekends we would do things but mostly she would dance. She had a 9-5 job during the week I had my job she had hers. But if she needed money she would just go to her book. It was full of names. I know one of those guys wanted to play patty cake with her.


    I worked on a 40-foot sailboat down in the tropics in the Caribbean for a time. That was back in 1995. We used to take people out sailing every weekend. It would be like, Hey man lets go out sailing and out we would go.


    This is one of the funniest things that happened to me while we were on the boat, was we were asked by the Key West Yacht Club to go out one Saturday to race. The wind was not strong enough for us to sail properly. We were sort of just sitting there. The wind was not working for us so the boat owner Rod just said screw it. So we stripped off all our cloths and streaked the race.  We all were naked as a j-bird. We were never invited back to the yacht club to race again.


    Rodney Erxlebenrg was the best fella I ever met. He helped straighten me up. He was older than me. One of the best lessons he ever taught me was to be nice to one another and to help each other out. I feel the same way today. That would be the most important lesson I could pass on. Forget about the people over in Iraq. Just protect the oil we found for them in 1950 under Eisenhower. He should not have given the oil to their president. Protect the oil and let them get on with it. Back to Rodney, he got an inheritance from his folks of oil stocks. So he is doing ok.  He was doing very well. He treated me very good and helped me out of some scrapes. I have some insurance papers here for him. If anything at all happens to him I guess I will have something.


    The way I met the gentleman was back in 1972 I was hitchhiking down through the keys. I was going from Coco Beach to Key West. I got just past Marathon were I came to the 7mile bridge and back then it was the old bridge. Not like the one they have today. It was very narrow and if two semi trucks were hugging the sides there was only about a foot between each of the mirrors on the inside. So I had my pack and I figured there was not enough room for all of us. I had a backpack that weighed as much as me, 150 pounds or so. There was no way I was going to go out on the bridge. So I sat down and waited for a ride the length of the bridge. After about a quarter of an hour he came along in a green gremlin. That was him Rodney.


    I was driving a limo for a while down there. But I did the trips to the gas station and maintenance work. I had a class D license back then it expired in 1995. I didn't drive the passengers. And I don't drive today.


    While out on the boat we had managed to survive one or two storms out there on the water. Not much to say about that. Though I did survived the biggest Hurricane in my life there. I was in Hurricane Andrew. That's enough! That is the biggest one I ever- He was the meanest little devil ever seen. It wiped out south Florida.


    At that time I was not out to sea but living in Key West, Florida. When it came across the peninsular of Florida through Homestead. We got just rain thank goodness. South Florida looked like a steamroller took it out. This one went through and it wiped out south Miami just like a cartoon.


    I was not part of the sailing crew when this Hurricane hit. It was quite a while after the boat was sold. I'll tell you when my friend decided to sell his boat he was kind enough to give me half the earnings from the sale anyway. He got about a million for it. I guess it was about half a million dollars apiece that he gave me in cash. You know in the movies where they have the money in the briefcase with the drug deals? Well it looked like that.


    What I did was get my backpack and put all the money in the bottom of the pack. Moved my other stuff up to the top half. And I hitched all over with that money there. It took me about 4 years to spend it all. I was walking down the street with $500,000 on my back. Can you imagine that?


    I left Key West in 1995. I walked from Homestead to Coco Beach carrying my equipment every step of the way. I put the unit on my shoulder and walked every step. I went there to work for a friend. He owned a vending stand, where he rented umbrellas, boogie boards, lounge chairs and such.


    I had the best job ever. You would kill for that job I had sittin on the beach and getting paid. I got paid about 3 dollars and some odd cents an hour to be on the beach and sit back and wait until someone who wanted to rent something. If they needed an umbrella, I had put them up. I would go down and set it up for them for a tip. If I got a tip, that was ok. At night I would sit on the beach and smoke a good doobie. Yes, I do smoke that stuff. I don't care if people know or not.


    I have held jobs one as a prep chef. I prepare vegetables for the cooks such as onions and peppers at restaurants. I was working on a Hotdog stand. They sold Italian sweet sausage. I just prepared for them to go out I would deliver the carts to the sales people. I was the delivery boy, clean up man, jack-of-all-trades, master of none of them.  I cut up onions or not so much now but I have in the past.


    I today make a living on what people are kind enough to donate to me. I sometimes sit on a street corner in Boulder [Pic] and open the door for woman and men who need help. Maybe they have their hands full. They sometimes are kind enough to tip me. One week this guy came up to me and told me about this site. A few weeks later here I am telling my stories. Maybe I will see him again someday.


    I came to Colorado about 5 years ago in August of 02 I walked from southern Missouri to Fort Lupton, Colorado pushing my cart. I left 4 days before Mothers day and I stepped over the line on the 2nd of August. You would see me on the Boulder Mall back then with an American flag in a piece of pvc. I had about 20 pickups. But I could only use pickup trucks and vans. Cars could not pick me up because I had too much stuff. It would have had to be a big car.


    I had 36 bottles of water that people had given me they weighed a lot and 15, 2 liter bottles in my cart. That put the weight I carried and walked with up over 300 pounds. I started with 175 pounds of gear including two suitcases, my hammock frame, hammock and sleeping bag. I got me a storage unit now that I keep that in. I pay in advance and am good for a couple more months.


    But I walked about 80 percent of the way. I only got 20 rides. One day two guys pulled up along side me as I was walking and pushing my cart. I could barely hear them say, "Not him". I saw them say it with their lips as they were looking at me out the car window. I guess they intended to roll me. But I had my hammock pole right beside my right hand. I considered it my equalizer. I would have just gone for their kneecaps and taken them out. They moved on with no issue.


    You might have seen me in August with a 3-wheel cart made with the front of a bicycle. I cut it 4" in front of the seat and used 2 pieces of rebar in PVC pipe. So I had made it with Hose clamps so if one day I had to take everything apart so I could ship it. I can take everything pack it, wrap it and ship it. So wherever I go I can take it with me.


    Seeing that it is Christmas time again I will say I have the most memorable Christmas down in Key West I had a real nice Christmas while I was on the sailboat. We had two lines they were hooked onto the jib and main sail. We pulled up the halyard and the lights went up with the sail. It was really nice to see. And spending it on the boat was great. It was special because I was with a good person to be with.


    Rod always treated me like a son. He is out in Galveston TX, I think now, on a 48 foot trawler. I have not talked with him since 1995. A lot of time has past. I should get a hold of him I suppose.


    I am thinking about getting into a small hotel room and try that out for a while. I like it here so I will be staying here. I am thinking about getting a trailer that I can fix up. A new adventure! I have a 3-wheel bike now that I want to put on a motor when I save up enough money. It will give me all the power I want because I have a nice little solar panel.


    I once in a while bet poker with the serial numbers on a dollar bill. I have one that has 9000001. So let anyone try to beat that hand. I have saved another with 5, aces's here.


    I spent this past Thanksgiving at the First Presbyterian Church here in Boulder. They gave us a turkey dinner with stuffing potatoes, the whole nine yards. I like or prefer having ham to turkey. That's what I would like for Christmas dinner this year. I am not really a turkey fan. I can't complain it warmed my belly put fuel in my engine. I don't drink alcohol at all I don't mind one or two special drinks or something like a little Champaign at Christmas.


    This Wednesday I will be going to meet with a Gold Smith. He is going to pay me a lot of money for my gold dust I have.  I was up in Gold Hill at the general Store. Some young man came down and said he needed someone to help him put up a fence around the pond up at the mill. He didn't pay me with the dust. When I got done with the fence. He said he needed someone to clean the Bins. They were 3 feet by 3 feet and 3 feet deep. When I got done I would climb out of the bins and I was covered with dust. I was all sparkling. So at night I would turn my sleeping bag inside out and climb in. I would move around until I could get the gold dust off. I got up and scraped it all up. It turns out I got over 4 pounds of gold dust doing that. It is all in about a gallon bag about 6 inches around. The guy is going to give me about $12,000 for it.


    When I get the money I might stay in a hotel for a month. Try that out for a while. I want to get a motor for my bike and a new dvd player to play a dvd's. I will then fix up my trailer. When I get the motor on my 3 wheeler. I want to go back the same route here if I can remember the way. I told people that I would look them up on the way back as I traveled through. Don't know if I will do that.


    This Christmas I have plans to be out on the street.