A disabled veteran from Cobb County needs his cane to get around.
“I’m in pain 24/7, there’s nothing I can do about it,” the veteran, who asked that his name not be used, told Channel 2 Action News.
But it wasn’t just a cane.
For the past eight years, the Army veteran, a grandfather who lives in Marietta, relied on a cane his daughter gave him while she fought cancer.
She’s now free of cancer, and the cane, which was made from a palm tree, came to represent her survival.
But last Sunday at a KFC in Calhoun, a man took the cane from the bathroom, propped it against a wall, picked up his order and left, surveillance video showed.
The veteran not only was weak without the cane, “it was beyond anger, it was disappointment,” he said.
He filed a report with Calhoun police and is using a replacement cane.
Now, a metro Atlanta woodworking group has stepped up to help.
The Gwinnett Woodworkers Association is offering to “get a cane in his hands,” group Vice President Robert Austin told AJC.com. “There’s no charge.”
The group has donated about 360 canes to the Veterans Administration in Atlanta as well as others to individuals, Austin said.
Meanwhile, the veteran is hoping his cane will be returned.
“I would cry,” he said, “and it would be tears of joy rather than the tears I’ve shed over its loss.”
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