Zac, aka Casper View—his stage name—has been panhandling in downtown Durham most of the winter. He used to play a fake guitar; I photographed him for a previous blog post, “Cardboard guitar blues.”

His dream was to get a real guitar, and someone from a neighboring office building kindly him gave him one, an Oscar Schmidt acoustic model.

Here Casper is on Day 2 of guitar ownership, with his dog, Lela.

Lisa Sorg is the editor of the
INDY. Her blog documents the small moments of life in the Triangle in photographs and stories—as a reminder of why we live here.