In this series:
"Life With Bonnie" star Bonnie Hunt on making a difference.
Breckin Meyer loves to make a difference with "pound puppies."
Comedian George Lopez helps folks back home
Emmy-winning talk show host Wayne Brady on helping
Moderator of "The View" recalls a poor boy
Papers lead readers to improve their cities
Never Give Up! By Dick Vitale
It's so Raven to help others

Listen to the kids in need
The host of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" and moderator of "The View" recalls a poor boy, with admiration and regret.
By Meredith Vieira

"I don't look for trouble. T-t-trouble comes to me." Anthony was only 8 when he offered up that wisdom. Maybe that's what comes from being forced to grow up too fast in a neighborhood that doesn't much care if you ever make it to adulthood. He was a poor kid whose father had long since abandoned him and his mother. I was a reporter for CBS News when I found him in Chicago. Or should I say he found me?

It was 1984, and I was doing a story on cutbacks in Chicago's school lunch program and what that meant to kids for whom school lunch often was a day's only meal. After interviewing a pack of first-graders, I invited them to pizza. "Sure," they said, "but can our friend Anthony come along?" He suddenly appeared, a towheaded boy in dirty clothes, with a runny nose and the most beautiful smile. That afternoon, Anthony held the pizza parlor door for me, asked me what sign I was, and talked about his life as if observing it from a distance: "Down, down, down, down, down ... poor Anthony." I flew home to New York thinking about "poor Anthony."

A year later, he was still on my mind. So I convinced my boss that Anthony would make a great story. He could articulate the feelings of all the kids who fell through the cracks in the Reaganomics era, all the kids with no one. The truth is, I missed him.

Same runny nose, same beautiful smile. As we walked through a park, he casually pointed out a used syringe lying in the sandbox. At the corner laundromat, he shied away from a group of boys smoking cigarettes, barely older than he was but done with school for good. We ended up at Anthony's apartment. In the kitchen were an empty cereal box and a soiled dishrag. He blew his nose in the rag and looked for his mother. She wasn't there. Anthony told me she'd probably gone off to be with a boyfriend or a bottle. Either way, she'd be back, sometime. He told me he loved her, and he meant it.

In the next days I interviewed adults in Anthony's life. His teacher told me he talked too much; I thought, maybe he talks too much because nobody listens. I visited his teenage aunt and uncle. She was pregnant; he was slumped in a couch. He said he set a perfect example: exactly what Anthony should never be. He told me he loved his nephew, and he meant it.

Our last morning, Anthony and I sat on a curb. He confessed his idea of heaven was hot fish sticks. I kept staring at that smile, wondering why it stayed. An Oscar Wilde quote came to my mind: "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." Finally I asked: "You're awfully strong for a little boy. Where does that strength come from?" He thought. "F-f-from inside." I gave him my work number and told him to call collect.

Over the years he did just that, so many times that it became an unwritten rule: If Anthony calls, accept the charges, whether I'm there or not. Sometimes he read his grades or a poem he'd written. Other times he'd read our horoscopes. We were the reporter in New York and the boy in Chicago, plotting our futures. I wanted to believe the calls reassured Anthony. I wanted to believe they made a difference. Eventually they dwindled, and then there were none.

After my profile on Anthony aired, people offered help. We set up a foundation, but eventually, like the phone calls, the contributions stopped. In 1991, I gave birth to my second son. We named him Gabriel Anthony: Gabriel for the angel, Anthony for the boy whose idea of heaven was hot fish sticks. Not long after, I received a letter from Anthony. He had finished school and was working in the city. Enclosed was a picture. Same beautiful smile.