Mandino - The Return of the Ragpicker

Mister Og, you are looking wonderful!

I could feel my heart thumping as I slowly turned my head toward the direction of the voice.

Leaning against the inside of the south wall, no more than ten steps away, was an old man who was nodding and smiling at me. He raised both arms in a friendly gesture of welcome as he continued to smile, and I finally took several steps toward him before coming to an abrupt halt. The old man had moved away from the wall, and now that he was standing upright I could see that he towered well above my six feet. He smiled again, beckoning me to come closer with his huge hands as if I were a timid child. I inhaled deeply and hardly recognized my voice when I said, Who are you? Your voice sounds familiar. You look familiar and yet I

His deep laugh resounded through the woods. Come a little closer, Mister Og. You are certain to recognize an old friend if you do.

Bantam Books by Og Mandino

A BETTER WAY TO LIVE

THE CHOICE

THE CHRIST COMMISSION

THE GIFT OF ACABAR (with Buddy Kaye)

THE GREATEST MIRACLE IN THE WORLD

THE GREATEST SALESMAN IN THE WORLD

THE GREATEST SALESMAN IN THE WORLD,

PART II: The End of the Story

THE GREATEST SECRET IN THE WORLD

THE GREATEST SUCCESS IN THE WORLD

MISSION: SUCCESS!

OG MANDINOS UNIVERSITY OF SUCCESS

THE RETURN OF THE RAGPICKER

The Return of the Ragpicker

THE RETURN OF THE RAGPICKER
A Bantam Book

PUBLISHING HISTORY
Bantam hardcover edition published March 1992
Bantam paperback edition / February 1993

All rights reserved.
Copyright1992 by Og Mandino.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 91-35078.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
For information address: Bantam Books.

eISBN: 978-0-307-78093-5

Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Random House, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the words Bantam Books and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada. Bantam Books, New York, New York.

v3.1

For Matt and Lori Mandino with Love

We are born for a higher destiny than that of earth. There is a realm where the rainbow never fades, where the stars will be spread out before us like islands that slumber on the ocean and where the beings that now pass before us, like shadows, will stay in our presence forever.

B ULWER-LYTTON

The mysterious old ragpicker, Simon Potter, who disappeared at the end of my book, The Greatest Miracle in the World

Did I ever expect to be writing about him again, in some future book?

For more than fifteen years, my response to hundreds of interviewers and thousands of letters was always the same not likely.

And so, you are now holding a book that I had never planned to write. If life is a series of surprises, as Emerson wrote, then the book you are about to read certainly ranks as a major surprise in a career that has been filled with them.

During the past quarter century my life has also been blessed with more good fortune and honors than any human being deserves.

I have shared both hunger and wealth, pain and joy with the woman I love by my side, and I have watched proudly as my two sons grew to manhood, married happily, and embarked on promising careers.

I have been inducted into the International Speakers Hall of Fame, received the Napoleon Hill Gold Medal for literary excellence, and read my biography, with pride, in Whos Who in the World.

Most important was the fulfillment of my childhood dream and that of my late, beloved mother to become a writer. That I stumbled along lifes often-rutted highways, plus a gutter or two, until I had passed the age of forty before reaching our cherished goal, was my fault and mine alone.

In retrospect, those early years of failure, despair, and poverty were far more valuable than any college education could have been. Since 1966, the fourteen books I have written, all dealing with the true meaning of success and happiness and how to capture those two elusive songbirds, have managed to sell more than twenty-five million copies in eighteen languages, from Tokyo to Rome, from Johannesburg to Sydney, from Mexico City to Stockholm! And one of them, The Greatest Salesman in the World, has ascended to especially rarified atmosphere by becoming the best-selling book of all time, in the entire world, in the field of sales! Dream fulfilled!

And yet, despite all those book sales and all the attention that The Greatest Salesman, both Part I and Part II, has received through the years, another of my books, The Greatest Miracle in the World, has consistently generated far more mail, since its publication in 1975, than all the other works combined!

The Greatest Miracle in the World is the story of my special friendship with a long-haired, giant old man, Simon Potter, who called himself a ragpicker because he spent all his time rescuing humans who had ended up on lifes refuse pile. Our accidental first meeting was in the dingy parking lot behind my office building, during the years when I headed Success Unlimited magazine in Chicago, and soon I was stopping by his tiny, book-filled apartment across the street almost nightly before driving to my suburban home. Over several memorable months he shared his sherry, his wisdom, and his compassion with me, and his kindly advice and counsel changed my life forever for the better. Then, one morning, he vanished without a trace. Amazingly, no one living in his apartment building recognized or admitted to knowing the old man from my description, even including the family residing in what had been his apartment, which they insisted they had occupied for four years! It was almost as if Simon had never existed except to me! His parting gift, discovered later on my desk, was a powerful piece he had written called The God Memorandum, a document containing four principles one must follow in order to enjoy a more fulfilling life. I shared the Memorandum with all my readers in the book and they responded!

The essence of their messages to me in what has continued, through the years, to be a never-ending avalanche of letters about The Greatest Miracle, is best contained in the following few excerpts from actual letters received:

Just one year ago, at this time, I was preparing to commit suicide. Your words, and those of your friend, the ragpicker in Greatest Miracle, saved my life. Today, I can honestly tell anyone that I am a miracle. Not just to be sober, but alive. Today I have serenity and joy in my life and your words helped carry me through all my days of hell.

I owe you so much. In the summer of 83, shortly after my divorce, I sat on a California beach reading