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Two Philly Boys Out For Walk
Andy gets a selfie with Isaiah Thomas.
Photos courtesy Andy Chandler
Isaiah Thomas, a digital creator who goes by the name Ministerzay, passed though Rockville on Sunday during one of the legs of his Philadelphia to California walk to raise money for charity.
Sunday afternoon, my wife messaged me, “hey, that man walking from Philly to Cali is walking into town.” I hurried outside and on my way out grabbed one of my many Phillies baseball caps, ran a block over and met him as he passed by the VFW across from the Ritz Theatre in downtown Rockville.
When he saw the ballcap, his eyes lit up, “you’re from Philly?”
“Berwyn to be exact.”
“Man, you from the rich part of town.”
“Yeah, but for all it’s worth, the Phillies can’t buy a win at this point.”
I fell in with him and we walked the next mile together. We discussed home, family and he wondered how on earth I ended up here.
“Marriage.”
I asked him about the car that struck him two weeks ago. I mentioned he looked pretty banged up in the hospital when he posted on Twitch. He chuckled, “you should have seen the car. I put the car in traction.” We laughed.
Thomas has a real passion for education in the inner city. A graduate of Lincoln High School in inner-city Philadelphia, he wanted to raise money for charity to help send kids to trade school and hopefully build a school there. “I wanted to show the kids that anything is possible.”
I asked how he planned on getting back to Philly. “I’d like to walk back, but this time pick a different route and visit parts of the country I hadn’t seen when I used to drive a box truck.”
After that? “Maybe go somewhere internationally like South America.”
When asked about if he’d done anything like this before he mentioned he’d done the Richmond Slave Trail the year before. He said it was about 400 miles.
As we walked a few well-wishers came by. One of them handed him a cup of water from McDonald’s and asked if he needed anything. He politely declined. One starstruck man drove up. “Man, I’ve seen you on social media! I can’t believe it’s you.” We stopped so he could get a few photos.
Finally, it came time to part ways, I told him a good place where he and the support team following him could stay and he mentioned a park with grills and picnic tables located about 10 miles down the road. “Oh, the Ernie Pyle Rest Area in Dana,” I replied.
“Yes.”
One last thing to do before parting: “E-A-G-L-E-S! EAGLES!” was the parting chant. I turned to head back into town a few moments later. Pretty soon, the neon vest disappeared over the hill.