Rick Badie's Gwinnett: Andy, Opie ... and Abdul-Latif

The last thing Andy wants to do is deliver an eviction notice. He comes up with novel ways to forestall the unpleasant task. He, Aunt Bee and Opie even organize a rummage sale to raise money. It falls way short.

Last week, I wrote about Numan Abdul-Latif of Lilburn. He was fretting over his property tax bill, which had shot up $62. The retiree didn’t know how — with a fixed income of around $1,200 a month and a disabled wife — he was going to pay the note. It’s due Oct. 15.

It didn’t take long for the phone to ring and the e-mails to arrive after the column ran.

“I admire Abdul-Latif’s career path [in that] he did exactly what internationals like him should do,” wrote one reader in an e-mail. “Get educated in the U.S., work a short time in the U.S., then return to his native country to teach or share in his homeland. . . . Please let me know how we might send a check. It won’t be much, but we would like to help some.”

Another caller left a message that he wanted to contact Abdul-Latif about a reverse mortgage. I hit the erase button.

Then there was the Gwinnett County resident who said he’d read the article after talking on the telephone with his daughter in Houston. She’s expecting. He’ll be a grandfather for the first time. The news caused him to reflect on his life, his fortunes. He told me he was keenly aware that, during stages of his 50-plus years on this earth, someone had reached down and pulled him up. They gave him a hand, regardless of whether he knew, recognized, acknowledged or deserved it.

Late Saturday, we met at Taco Mac off Mountain Industrial Boulevard. He pressed a check in my hand. He had me pledge to neither divulge his name publicly nor share it with the Abdul-Latif family.

I smelled the coffee as soon as I stepped into Abdul-Latif’s home on Monday morning. He’s a short man, bespectacled, with a firm handshake and good eye contact. He and his wife, Margaret, had the same question: Who is this person with the good will to open his checkbook for a stranger? I explained the Samaritan’s wishes. They asked me to pass along two words that do little justice to their gratefulness: “Thank you.”

That evening, a little online research revealed that “Andy Forecloses” was the title of the Andy Griffith episode I’d seen the other night. In it, Andy tries to delay the task of delivering the eviction notice as long as possible.

The eviction notice has to be delivered. Then, the sheriff does something clever. He gets Weaver, the landlord and property owner, to tag along.

Weaver has a change of heart when he sees the family that will be ousted. He stops the eviction and even gives Scobey a job in his furniture store.

A family gets spared in Mayberry. Just as one gets a reprieve in Lilburn.

Rick Badie, an Opinion columnist, is based in Gwinnett. Reach him at rbadie@ajc.com or 770-263-3875.