Posted on 02/12/25
| News Source: WBAL TV
Baltimore, MD - Feb. 12, 2025 - It may be Valentine's week, but forget the romance.
Instead, how about a "bromance?"
A tow truck driver and a rabbi have become fast friends after a chance encounter in the snow.
At AAA's Fleet Garage in Woodlawn, Rabbi Avi Sharfman meets up with roadside technician Jerome Belton, someone he considers a good friend.
"I would say it's a lot more than that. I would say brothers," Sharfman told 11 News.
Watching the two, it's hard to believe that just a few weeks ago, they were strangers.
Sharfman, a chaplain for LifeBridge Health, was on his way to provide angel services in January for a dying man in hospice when his car went into a snowbank. He called AAA for help.
"AAA shows up, and it's Jerome. Jerome gets out of the truck, and with his big smile on his face, says, 'I've got you,'" Sharfman said.
"I just jumped into action for some reason. It was like I had wings on the back, and I was like, 'Let's go down there,'" Belton said.
"That, to me, was the spiritual care that I needed in that moment," Sharfman said.
Sharfman told 11 News he made it to the family in time, and he wrote a letter to AAA about Belton. Since then, the two have had many deep conversations and now consider one another family.
"I'm never going to forget Avi. I don't know, I'm never going to forget him," Belton told 11 News.
"We can both talk to each other about the most difficult of things and say, 'I know you're struggling. I'm going through this, but I'm there for you, my brother,'" Sharfman told 11 News.
Reflecting on the beginnings of an unbreakable bond, Belton told 11 News: "It was just a connection of two lights, you know what I'm saying? When you put a light over here and a light over here, you bring them together and it just gets brighter. That's all it was. I didn't know him. He didn't know me. He needed help (and) I was there to help."
Last year, AAA came to the aid of more than 151,000 people in Maryland, and while every interaction may not end up like this one, Sharfman and Belton are proof it's never too late to make a new friend and that good things can come from a bad situation.
"He took on his wings, I took on mine and we both flew together to be able to create a relationship that will be everlasting," Sharfman told 11 News.