‘The only job that will hire me’: A door camera caught an 81-year-old Texas man struggling to carry luggage as part of his delivery job

Don Johnson was delivering a bag Erin Howell had misplaced during a recent trip when he made noise dropping it on the steps outside her home in The Colony, a Dallas-Fort Worth suburb, drawing her outside, he later told NBC5 Dallas-Fort Worth. “The other day, my door cam caught an 81-year-old man slowly and painstakingly carrying my heavy luggage that had been lost on a recent flight up a steep flight of stairs. He looked absolutely exhausted, and his steps were heavy with effort,” Howell wrote on GoFundMe.

“It completely broke my heart to see a man of his age doing such intense, grueling physical labor.” For the past three years, Johnson has taken on independent contract work hauling lost luggage to strangers’ doors, a job he found himself needing after Josephine’s aggressive cancer diagnosis. The pair, married for nearly six decades, relocated into their daughter’s home as the illness progressed, but mounting treatment costs and prescription bills eventually sent Johnson looking for a paycheck again.

“It’s the only job that will hire me,” he told Howell. He later told the outlet he’d tried Amazon and Walmart first. “It was either not the right moment, or they just passed on me.” “I appreciate what we do get from insurance, but it doesn’t cover it all. And cancer treatment is very expensive,” he added.

He kept working 14-hour days even as his car broke down

Fourteen-hour shifts became routine for Johnson, and the road wear added up fast: his car has logged over 200K miles ferrying bags across the region, leaving it prone to breaking down. Johnson had begun having car trouble and cutting back his hours in the week before Howell’s video surfaced, the outlet reported, calling the timing of the fundraiser’s arrival “nearly perfect.”

“At an age when he should be resting and spending every precious single moment by his wife’s side, he is out on the road lifting heavy bags just to keep her alive and cared for,” Howell said. Asked what keeps him going, Johnson pointed to something simpler than strategy. “You just have to get that grit and prayer and go through and get to the other side,” he said. “It takes you a moment to adjust, but then you just carry on.”

Howell started a GoFundMe, titled “Help Don Retire,” and also created a TikTok page under the same name to help spread the word, the outlet stated. “Every single dollar raised from this campaign will go directly to helping them survive this crisis,” she wrote. As of publication, the campaign had raised $346,484 of a $400K goal from more than 6,300 donations. Josephine said she didn’t see the response coming. “I’m still stunned that people responded. I wasn’t expecting any response,” she said.

Johnson said the support has changed his outlook. “I think I’m going to be able to stop working, and that’s amazing,” he told the outlet. “So we’re not quite totally over the hump yet, but we’re getting there very quickly.” Josephine said the response has given her strength to keep fighting, and after 57 years of marriage, it’s shown her something new about her husband. “I’m so happy that he turned out to be the man he is,” she said.

“I can face it. I think that’s the big difference. Some have made comments and they’re praying for us. And it’s just, it’s a joyful feeling.”