He’s as much a fixture along Route 115 in Blakeslee as is McGinley’s Trail Lodge and the Pocono Farmers’ Market.

You can find him in the early morning, in the midafternoon, or at sundown.

His daily presence along the shoulder of the road is predictable even in snow, ice, or rain and when temperatures near the century mark.

I have seen this man, who carries with him many years of age, wearing a heavy winter coat when wind chills are below freezing or a short sleeve shirt tucked under a pair of suspenders when the summer sun blazes upon the asphalt.

He’s a large man, well over 6 feet tall and he wears a red bandanna wrapped around the top of his head above a rugged face that features a grizzly gray beard which drops down below his chin.

Driving on my way to Ahart’s Market, I look for him and more often than not, there he is, moving in very short steps either toward or away from the direction of my vehicle. Sometimes, I find him resting upon the guardrail with arms folded and walking cane in hand.

I know not where he lives. That’s none of my business. Yet when you see him as much as I do year after year during my travel that way, I can’t help but feel he’s no stranger to me, so much that I can put myself in his shoes and attempt to understand his life, his past, and what he might be thinking as he takes another careful step steadied by his cane.

That’s a privilege a writer has - to imagine a man’s lifetime with no more clues than his physical appearance and a common activity that gets him from one place to another.

He might have a health condition that requires he take regular walks. His routine is an acquired habit like that of the jogger I see running along the roadside of Route 903 with her long blonde ponytail swinging side to side from under a baseball cap.

Maybe the Walking Man is married. His wife could be at home and his grown children might visit him often.

Perhaps he’s been alone for quite some time; the love of his life has passed away and no one visits. If that’s the case, his walks provide him an opportunity to observe people driving by that he will never know. It could be his way of remaining in touch with the world outside the thick walls of a house that shelters his solitude.

I can only speculate his truth. The Walking Man intrigues me in ways that people who I have known for quite some time, do not. The mystery about him is not for me to solve. That’s the fascination, an appealing curiosity I have about him as he ambles along the same path each day.

We live in a country where people surround their lives with high fences and alarm systems. We look the other way when we see strangers walk past us. We’re afraid of people we don’t know in public places. The nightly news is frightening enough to keep us hunkered down inside our homes.

Our neighborhoods are filled with people we choose to ignore and yet, the Walking Man, gives motorists no other choice but to acknowledge his existence when steering clear of his massive frame while he negotiates the narrow space between the guard rail and the road.

One might think that as he walks his way, it’s a means without an end. Welsh poet, Gwyn Thomas said, “But the beauty is in the walking - we are betrayed by destinations.”

I get that. Whenever I take walks by myself, my mind clicks into an energy mode. Sometimes, I get ideas for this column while I’m moving my feet. With no GPS, I am freed from a map of destination. Direction matters not when my shoes crunch upon a gravel road and the fresh air awakens my senses.

The Walking Man moves in slow motion like the clouds that drift above him. His mind’s eye could see his thoughts form into vivid pictures while blinding his actual vision of the immediate surroundings. Perhaps he is looking into his future.

Author, Ranjani Rao wrote, “Walking didn’t bring me to a destination, yet it gave me a way to negotiate the unknown. Walking was my moving meditation.”

One might ask why I don’t pull my car over and speak to the Walking Man. My reply would be that I do not want to disturb the stream of his thoughts. Walking and thinking go together like peanut butter and jelly. Permit him a private moment to take a bite of introspection without interruption. One other thing is for certain. He has a sacred purpose in his endeavor that deserves nothing less than my unconditional respect.

I hope he finds fulfillment in what he does, whether it be an exercise in gratitude for being alive, a prescription for an ailing body or some solace for a troubled soul. If someday he shall disappear permanently from my observation, I will miss him. The Walking Man has become a part of my life experience that has given me an extraordinary insight into the human condition.

Rich Strack can be reached at richiesadie11@gmail.com