He was about 70 years old and had seen better days. As he hobbled between the rows of cars in the parking lot, head bowed and studying the ground like a map, I figured he must have lost something.
So I asked.
“Nope,” he said. “But other people have, and that’s what I’m trying to find.”
Before I could reply, there was an “Aha.”
The man bent to the asphalt, picked up a coin and examined it. “Nickel,” he said. “That’s 65 cents, and the morning’s just started.”
And into his pocket it went.
Your parents always told you to hold your head up. Your parents never met Acie Jenkins.
Jenkins is retired. And while he’s not exactly down and out, he practices a daily ritual that is a model of thrift, if not outright enterprise.
Every morning as central Denver’s surface parking lots fill up, he cruises them for dropped coins. The lots with cash boxes are the best: People are always getting out of their vehicles, fumbling for change. Some of it inevitably winds up on the pavement.
Not everyone can be bothered to pick up a penny. Jenkins can.
“On a good morning, I can usually find about three, maybe four dollars,” he said. “You’ve just got to know where to look. First I go to the cash box to see if anyone dropped anything, but the real place to look is by the drivers’ doors.
“That’s where you find stuff.”
Jenkins’ hair was white and his teeth weren’t in great shape. But he sported a new pair of black tennis shoes and a purple Rockies jacket.
He had barbered all over the Lone Star State before moving here about a dozen years ago.
“Got too hot in Texas,” he said. “Don’t get me started on Houston.”
I asked Jenkins how long he had been on coin patrol. It started about 10 years ago, he said. He noticed he was finding a lot of change on the sidewalk — he was on a minor roll filling an empty Jif jar at his house — and it turned into a hobby.
“It’s just something I have a knack for,” he said.
Some people can paint. Others can play “Moonlight Sonata” on the piano. Jenkins finds coins the rest of us overlook.
My kid brother once found a $5 bill under a cedar tree in the middle of North Carolina’s Shining Rock Wilderness. But next to a pro like Jenkins, he was merely a gifted amateur.
Jenkins asked me if I wanted to tag along with him a bit.
It’s not every day you get to observe a master of anything. Watching Jenkins search for coins might not rank with seeing gazillionaire Warren Buffett turn pig iron into gold at the touch of his hand, but I figured that in this economy, any tips would help.
We crossed Pearl Street from a $3-a-day lot to a $2.75 lot.
“Now this will be better,” Jenkins said. “Folks here have to come up with 75 cents in change, so they’ll be pulling coins out of their pockets as they head to the box.”
Jenkins began walking the rows, back and forth. Inside of five minutes, he found nearly a dollar in coins, including two quarters. A quick score.
“You just have to keep an eye out for it,” he said. “It’s right at your feet.”
I said goodbye and headed to the office, eyes to the ground, hoping a little change was going to come.
William Porter’s column runs Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Reach him at 303-954-1977 or wporter@denverpost.com.
