Bike rider, 81, has a big heart

Paul Iverson/Caller-Times

Alberto P. Rodriguez rides his bike every day except Sunday to pick up aluminum cans along a familiar route. His dog, Lassie, tags along.

Time and again, Alberto P. Rodriguez has found that one good deed begets another. _In his neighborhood on 15th Street, for example, are two neighbors who now and then make the 81-year-old widower a home-cooked meal, their way of saying thank you for the times he has mowed their yard.
   But good deeds unfold miles beyond his own neighborhood through people who set aside aluminum cans for Rodriguez, who has been trading recyclables for cash for 13 years.
   The money enables Rodriguez to make a bus trip or two to Río Bravo, Mexico, every year to see his stepmother. And on each trip, Rodriguez takes food, clothing and shoes to give to those so poor they have no electricity or running water.
   When he returns, he brings back Mexican cookies, candy and tortillas to give to neighbors.
   Sharing what he has
   Rodriguez, who has lived in the same modest, non air-conditioned rental home for 28 years, said he may have little in the way of material comforts, but what he has he happily shares with others.
   "I'll keep sharing what I have and collecting cans until I can't anymore," said Rodriguez in his native Spanish.
   That generous nature is why neighbors, family, friends, even strangers, collect aluminum cans for him, said Reyes P. Villarreal, an 86-year-old neighbor who, whenever she has company, makes sure to collect discarded soda pop cans for Rodriguez.
   Rodriguez's can-collecting began in 1988, three years after retiring as an oil rig pipeline laborer. At the time, his wife, now deceased, had had a leg amputated because

Paul Iverson/Caller-Times

Alberto P. Rodriguez rides a route from his home near the Crosstown Expressway to the bayfront and back to find cans.

of diabetes and Rodriguez, wanting to bring in a few extra dollars to help with household expenses, began riding his bike around the area looking for cans.
   Block by block he extended his can-collecting route. Now he collects several extra tall plastic bags averaging 70 to 80 pounds each and his two trips per year to the recycling center earn him around $350 each.
   Until recently, Rodriguez was pedaling his route three times a day, Monday through Saturday, biking from his doorstep to Ocean Drive, around the perimeter of Christus Spohn Hospital Shoreline and back to his neighborhood nestled in the shadow of the Crosstown Expressway.
   "He never collects on Sunday," his daughter, San Juanita R. Cantu, said. "That's a holy day meant for God."
   One trip per day
   These days Rodriguez makes a single trip per day, starting his route at 8 a.m. in the same manner he has for more than a decade - by making the sign of the cross as he steps out onto his porch. Accompanying him is Lassie, the stray who latched on to Rodriguez a couple of years ago and has become such a good can-collecting companion she stops to alert him when he has missed a can on the road.

Paul Iverson/Caller-Times

Alberto P. Rodriguez searches through dumpsters for many of the aluminum cans he turns in for recycling.

   "When he leaves for his visits to Mexico, the neighborhood just isn't the same," said Maria Isabel Sanchez, 55, a home health care provider who has known Rodriguez for 12 years and whose clients include Rodriguez's neighbor Villarreal.
   "Every morning we see him in his cowboy hat and suspenders pedaling down the street with Lassie chasing after him. Rodriguez is so friendly, he has a smile for everyone, even strangers."
   Villarreal, who reciprocates Rodriguez's gesture of mowing her yard for free by making him his favorite dishes of enchiladas, rice and beans, said he is such a good neighbor he even checks up on her and Sanchez in the mornings to see if all is well.
   "There aren't very many people like that anymore," Villarreal said. "In this day and age, you can't trust anybody. But as for Mr. Rodriguez, he is one you can always trust and count on."