Every morning, the same ritual: down the street, broom in hand, grey cap and a smile without a hurry.

Don Jaime has been sweeping the neighborhood sidewalks for more than twenty years. Some greeted him with forced courtesy. Others just ignored it.

– How are you today, Don Jaime? —asked the baker.

— Alive and Grateful. It’s not small — he said, looking up.

Once a week, I sweep the sidewalk of the municipal library. He used to sit there for a few minutes and watch the students come in and out. Sometimes, I would pick up a book that someone forgot, leaf it, smell it, return it.

One morning, Lucía, a young Philosophy student, saw him reading Kierkegaard sitting on the curb.

– Do you like that author? —he asked, curious.

“He makes me despair,” he replied without raising his gaze, but he is right when he says that life can only be understood looking backward, although it must be lived forwards.

Lucía was left speechless.

—Have you read philosophy?

—A little bit. When I had nowhere to sleep, libraries were my refuge. Books don’t judge.

– And why… —he hesitated— why is he sweeping streets?

Don Jaime closed the book, with the calmness of who has nothing to prove.

– Because I’m fed. Because he allows me to see the sunrise every day. Because it’s a worthy job. What else is needed?

Lucía didn’t know what to say. She felt embarrassed. She, who dreamed of writing essays on the meaning of life, had never thought that someone like him could have more answers than the authors she studied.

Days later, he invited him for coffee.

—Do you know what’s the most difficult thing about this job? —he asked while slowly removing the sugar.

—What?

—Let them look at you like you’re invisible. Let them think your worth depends on how much you get paid per hour.

“But you’re worth much more,” she said, sincerely.

—We are all worth so much more. But not everyone has eyes to see it.

Lucía decided to write an article about him. He titled it “The Philosopher Sweeper” and published it in the university newspaper. The story has gone viral.

The next day, several people began to stop to talk to Don Jaime. Some out of sincere curiosity, others just out of fashion. A philosophy professor even wanted to interview him for a TV show.

But he refused.

—I don’t need late applause. I prefer silence to those who really listen.

– Doesn’t it bother you that they admire you now when they ignored you before? —Lucia asked.

—Admiration is as false as contempt when it is not born of the soul. I’m not looking for admiration. Only humanity.

That sentence is etched in her forever.

Lucía finished her career, wrote her thesis inspired by dialogues with Don Jaime, and devoted herself to touring schools talking about the value of every human being, beyond their profession or appearance.

And Don Jaime… she kept on sweeping.

But now, every time he passed his broom across the floor, I knew he was cleaning up something more than leaves. I was clearing up the prejudices.