Alone No Longer

It took hitting a frightening bottom for Michael Bailey--alone and penniless in a foreign country--to discover a new life with the help of a community of strangers.

Last year, Bailey responded to his mother’s death by going off to Mexico, where he was robbed, injured and stranded for more than a month, sleeping out in the open. He became the subject of news stories after he somehow found his way back home, aided by local Mexican authorities and a pastor in Texas.

Even after he finally made it back to his house in Orange--which he had left with the lights on and the front door open--Bailey had no water and little more than a jar of pennies on which to live.

But his plight also touched the hearts and hands of people who could and did help.

“By the time we got in touch with him, he was down to three cans of pork and beans and a can of corn,” said Phoebe Pfeiffer, who heard about Bailey’s troubles and offered to hook him up to various services for help. “It was awful and he was afraid.”

Bailey is a different man these days. For the first time in his life, he has friends and plans and a new understanding of himself. He never knew he was autistic--and therefore eligible for disability payments--until last year, when Pfeiffer persuaded a specialist at UCI Medical Center to evaluate him.

“I think I’ve done real good,” Bailey said from the house where he grew up. “I think it’s all been real nice.”

His story came close to having a much different ending, though. Bailey said he never could have survived alone if not for the handful of strangers who came to his aid.

It began with the death of his mother, Bertha Bailey, in March of last year.

The two had been inseparable since his father’s death some 36 years earlier, and Bailey faithfully cared for her as she became increasingly incapacitated by arthritis. He continued to take her to their favorite bench at a nearby shopping center, where they liked to sit and people-watch, until her crippled body could no longer take the short trip. He paid the bills and fixed her meals. He sat with her for hours on end.

When she died, Bailey packed two bags, bought a one-way bus ticket to Ensenada and set off on what turned into a 45-day odyssey. His suitcase, money and a treasured photograph of his mother were stolen. He suffered a head injury. But he also met people who helped him get back to the United States.

“People were real nice for the most part,” Bailey said.

He slept in the bus terminal in Mexico City for days and was directed to immigration officials who befriended him and fed him corn on the cob and finally got him aboard a bus bound for Texas. After days of sleeping near the railroad tracks in Brownsville, Bailey met a priest who scraped some money together and bought his $90 bus ticket back to Santa Ana.

The media attention given to Bailey’s solitary journey caught Pfeiffer’s attention in Mission Viejo, where she runs a program dedicated to finding housing for developmentally disabled adults.

“I couldn’t help thinking Michael was an undiagnosed developmentally disabled man who needed help,” Pfeiffer said. “And there’s just something about him that makes you want to reach out and take him right in.”

The first thing Pfeiffer did was make an appointment for Bailey at the neurology department at UCI, where doctors confirmed her suspicions that he was autistic. Then she secured pro bono legal help from two Irvine attorneys, who won a favorable judgment for Bailey against a contractor who had charged him about $60,000--his mother’s entire life savings--for dubious home improvement work. Another attorney helped Bailey obtain the title to his mother’s house through probate.

“She’s really worked wonders for me,” Bailey said of Pfeiffer, who is quick to turn the credit back to him.

“No, Michael is the one who did so much of the work,” she said. “He wanted to get help and he was strong and brave through all of it.”

Now Bailey is preparing for the new year in ways he never dreamed possible: traveling and sailing, parties and cookouts. Many of the events, including a trip to England, Scotland and Ireland next summer, are planned through Project Independence, which helps developmentally disabled adults improve their quality of life while living alone.

For Bailey, who made few friends in his lifetime and rarely ventured out of his childhood home, Project Independence has opened doors to a world he used to only read about. He is most excited, he said, about being part of a sailing crew for the Newport to Ensenada boat race next year.

“I know a lot about ships because I love to read about them,” Bailey said. “It’s going to be a real treat sailing like that with my friends.”

Hearing that, a cloud of worry passed over Pfeiffer’s face.

“You should learn how to swim first,” she said, patting Bailey’s back.

“Well, OK,” he replied. “I could do that too.”