A promise kept to honor Ski

On the afternoon of Wednesday, Nov. 3, Carol Dostert kept her promise to Ski.
She owed Ski $565.42, and she intended to pay that debt. And even though Ski’s widow, Iris, had to officially collect the debt, both Iris and Dostert believe Ski knows the debt was paid in full.
Ski, of course is the late Robert “Ski” Kaliszewski, the former Custer mechanic recently mourned by the community upon his passing July 23. Ski was known by the vast majority of the community, not only for his mechanicing prowess, but for the size of his heart.
It’s a heart that helped Dostert when nobody else would. It’s a heart that helped Dostert when some told it not to.
Dostert and Ski had never crossed paths before last summer. She is a full-time traveler who lives out of her 1997 Ford Explorer. Prior to that Dostert was homeless on the streets of Washington, D.C. She would sleep over night on a bench or in a tent near the Capitol Police headquarters and Senate buildings, and would leave early in the morning before the commotion of the day started.
Dostert is a victim of multiple traumas, and decided traveling while spending time in the nation’s forest would be a way for her to heal. So, she acquired her Explorer and set off across the country, changing her residency to South Dakota, as the state allows for full-time traveler status.
“I couldn’t afford an RV or a camper van like most full-time travelers have, but I knew I needed to get out of my situation,” she said. “I worry my old car may not make it much longer, but I thank God I still have it. It’s my only shelter and I cannot go back to living on the streets.”
While in the Black Hills, her Explorer began to have minor problems—or so she thought. She made her way to Custer and asked locals for a trustworthy mechanic. She was told to go see Ski at DJ’s Auto.
“I said, ‘what if he tells me there are things wrong that aren’t?’” she asked the person.
She could tell the person was appalled at the suggestion that Ski would cheat anybody.
“They said, ‘he’s a Christian!’” she recalled.
After all, DJ’s stood for Doing Jesus’ Service.
So, she headed to DJ’s, saw open garage doors and found Ski. He was busy working on other vehicles, but he listened to Dostert, who was concerned her engine light was on. He ran a diagnostic and concluded there was nothing wrong with the vehicle. He then topped off the fluids. He accepted no money for his help.
She drove away to continue her healing journey, satisfied she had found a mechanic she could trust.
Trust. It’s a strong word for Dostert, who after her trauma finds it hard to trust anyone, let alone a man. These days she trusts few people, having been let down or hurt by both friends and strangers.
But she felt comfortable around Ski. It was someone she could in fact trust.
Last June she made her way back to South Dakota, and was having trouble steering her Explorer. She again pulled into DJ’s driveway, and Ski assessed the damage. She had a broken bearing that he would have to order.
She camped in the forest a couple of days between Custer and Hill City before driving back to Custer to have the vehicle repaired. Well, she tried to drive back, anyway.
Halfway between the two towns the vehicle became impossible to steer and she had to pull over. When she got out she saw flames shooting out of her wheel well. The bearing had done more than broke—it had ground to the point the friction started a fire. She frantically waved at traffic for help. An RV pulled over and put the fire out. Her car was towed to Custer—to DJ’s of course.
Ski once again came to the rescue. A couple of days later, he told her the Explorer was ready to hit the road again. When she arrived at his shop, she saw the bill: $1,265. Had she known the repairs were going to cost that much, she said, she would have never had him do the work, even though her vehicle was her shelter.
“I was like, ‘I can’t do that,’” she said.
Ski told her he knew she couldn’t pay for it. He told her he had prayed on it, and God had told him to help her. He didn’t expect payment.
“It was his decision. I didn’t ask him to do it,” Dostert said.
Dostert vowed she would repay him. She doesn’t think he believed her. Some told him not to let her take the vehicle away, that he would never see a dime from her.
“I cried,” she said of her reaction when Ski told her to take the vehicle without paying. She again started to cry when she thinks of that moment.
“I’ve received help along the way but not always right when I needed it,” she said. “Nobody owes me anything. I don’t expect anyone to do this for free. I said ‘I promise I will not cheat you and I will be back.’”
She said she hugged Ski when he told her she could take the vehicle, overcome by emotion, unable to speak. She said Ski had to turn away as well. Iris believes her sometimes gruff but loveable husband was probably going to cry too.
“He felt it,” Dostert said of her gratitude. “I know he did.”
She drove to Rapid City after leaving DJ’s, bought needed supplies and returned that evening. She went to DJ’s and handed Ski his first $400 payment. She could tell he was both shocked and excited to receive the payment.
“He said, ‘you proved them wrong,’” she said of the people who had cautioned him against helping her. She understood his friends’ concerns.
“They were trying to look out for him,” she said. “I’m sure he has helped people he has never seen again.”
As a matter of fact, he has.
“All the time,” Iris said. “Throughout his entire career of being a mechanic. He loved people and felt that was his calling from God to help others.”
Not only did he do work he was never paid for, Iris also saw her husband hand people cash for fuel. It was that big heart.
One month after that initial payment, Dostert paid Ski another $100. The next day she paid $200 more. When she finally had enough money to pay the balance, she drove into Custer in the early morning hours of a September day, unaware Ski had passed away. She pulled into DJ’s driveway, but noticed his sign was down and the cars were gone from the lot. She tried to peer into the window to see if Ski was around. She then headed into Custer to get fuel, and was told by someone at the gas station Ski had died in late July.
She was saddened, but still determined to pay the man who had helped her so much. She set up a meeting with Iris to finish paying the debt. The two met on site at the former DJ’s, now shuttered with only the occasional turkey roaming the driveway Ski was so ubiquitous in for  years.
The two embraced, laughed, cried and shared stories about Ski before Dostert took $564.42 in cash from a bank envelope  and handed it to Iris.
Ski was paid in full.
“I don’t know that I have the words,” Dostert said when asked what Ski meant to her. “I so wish he was here right now.”
“He knows,” Iris responded.
It warms Iris’ heart to hear stories like those of Carol, people who Ski touched through his generosity throughout his life. She said she had no idea the legacy he had left in Custer until the cards, gifts and donations began to pour in following his death.
“What has gotten me through this is the love of this community. The stories I hear about him, how much he was loved, how much he helped,” she said. “The outpouring has been overwhelming. It’s not my loss as much as the community’s. People ask me how I’m doing. I’m doing OK. I’ve been blessed. The community hurts.”
Iris said Ski loved being a mechanic and loved to help people—even a complete stranger like Carol Dostert—and the blessings her husband gave have now come back around.
“He was a loving, generous, caring man who had a heart for people and a heart for God,” she said. “That was his gift.”