PORTLAND, Maine — Sebastien Valentino, who also goes by the name Train Wreck, sat on sliver of cardboard atop a granite bench on Customs House Wharf Tuesday morning, Christmas Eve.
Across the way, holiday shoppers bustled in and out of Harbor Fish Market, tromping through fresh, fallen snow. None paid Valentino any attention as he scribbled a makeshift sign with a magenta marker which read: “Spread some cheer, buy me a beers.”
“I like to make people laugh,” he said, “I like to write signs like ‘will wrestle your mother-in-law for fried chicken.'”
Christmas music played somewhere in the distance. People walked by laden with food and libations. Pure, white snow covered wreaths, garlands and twinkling lights while Valentino sat by a graffitied dumpster, in front of a mud puddle.
Yet, he was in a good mood, hopeful, even jolly.
Valentino said he wasn’t homeless or desperate. He identified himself as a “hobo” who’d been riding the rails, all over the country, since he got out of the U.S. Navy in 1997. Originally from Louisiana, the veteran was in town because he heard Portland had a good VA clinic.
“You know what ‘hobo’ stands for, don’t you?” Valentino said. “Help other brothers out. A hobo will travel and work. Then you got a tramp, a tramp will travel but not work. A bum won’t work or travel.”
His last job, he said, was on the Gulf Coast, working a shrimp boat. That was a few months back. Then he hit the rails, eventually getting off a train in South Portland’s Rigby Yard.
“I traveled all the way and used my [shrimp boat] money to buy supplies,” Valentino said. “I’ll buy my food first, get my cigarettes and my booze and then whatever gear I need.”
He said he’s loved the hobo life, the freedom and the friends he’s made around the country. But this trip will be his last. He’s going home to Louisiana as soon as he raises the funds, he said.
“I’m done,” he said. “My mother and dad died about seven years ago, but I still have some family there.”
In the meantime, Valentino said he’d keep flying his signs and maybe pick up some day work to raise the money to get back home. He still had a couple appointments at the VA clinic in town to get to first.
“I’ll probably sleep right here tonight. I’ve got a good piece of cardboard and a couple pallets – or over there,” he said, pointing to a heating vent belching steam.
Just then, someone handed him a five dollar bill.
“Merry Christmas, brother,” Valentino said, giving the man a fist bump.
