There are people out there who waste no time mumbling, who have a way of looking you dead in the eye and saying exactly what’s on their mind. The words “if,” and “but” don’t exist for these people. Days after talking to them, you’ll find yourself remembering snatches of conversation, as though they were the words to a moving and powerful speech about nothing in particular.

Ed Arthurs is one of these people, and he’s the vendor of the week.

“I’ve watched kids pop out of bellies, now they’re yea tall,” said Arthurs of some of the customers he’s come to know best. Hearing that, I felt sure that if Ed Arthurs ever wrote a book, then it would win the Nobel Prize.

He has sold vacuums in Texas, Georgia, and Ohio (“That’s a hard job,” he said with a grim smile). His service in the army brought Arthurs to Germany and Mexico by way of Ft. Smith, Texas. He has worked as a carpenter and a professional tree-trimmer.

It was tree-trimming, in fact, that brought Arthurs to Seattle—like too many, Ed Arthurs’ path to homelessness began with an accident. While trimming a tree, Arthurs fell and broke his back. By the time he’d made his way to Washington, it was clear that Arthurs wouldn’t be able to work as an arborist or carpenter, as he had before.

Luckily for Real Change, Arthurs as much as stumbled over the paper.

“I saw a guy selling papers, and I thought, ‘I could do that from a wheelchair.’” And that’s just what Arthurs does these days at 3rd and University in front of Benaroya Hall. Arthurs is one of Real Change’s most consistent vendors, and he says Seattle “could be home.”

“Keep supporting the paper,” said Arthurs. Selling Real Change “is like going home each morning instead of going to work.”

Who’s the special person who offers you Real Change? Nominate them for Vendor of the Week: editor@realchangenews.org