For years, Elwyn Murphy sat metres from the entrance of the Air Canada Centre, but never once stepped inside.

That is, until last Thursday, when an act of street-level serendipity plucked the homeless man from the pavement to the stands above centre ice. His first Maple Leafs game.

The random benefactors, Michelle Gingrich and fiancé Todd Brilhante, had just upgraded their seats, getting a whole new pair. The Waterloo-area twosome gave the original ticket to Murphy, a man who was sitting outside in the cold.

“This couple walking by me asks if I want to go to the hockey game and I said, ‘well sure, I’ve never been to a Toronto Maple Leafs game before,’ ” recalled Murphy.

Later, Gingrich uploaded to Facebook a photograph they’d taken to remember the occasion and encouraged others to spread the love.

“It made us realize it is so easy to put a smile on someone’s face,” she wrote. “Give them an experience they’ve never had and . . . take this gentleman away from a cold night alone.”

The image that began with a hockey ticket amassed more than 40,000 likes online. Several thousand shares later, the blurry cellphone photo popped up on Victor Boudreau’s computer monitor, some 1,800 kilometres away in Port Hawkesbury, N.S.

The 31-year-old did a double take. Was that his long-lost uncle? It couldn’t be. The man disappeared six years ago, and the family thought he was dead.

“All of a sudden I see a picture of him, and he has a beard,” said Boudreau. “He never had a beard before, but I knew it was him because of the eyes.”

Boudreau recalls Murphy leaving Nova Scotia sometime in 2010. Family members called police and the Salvation Army but they were unable to locate him. His reappearance left his relatives overjoyed and feeling some peace, knowing he’s alive.

“I’d like to shake his hand, hug him and tell him how happy I am I found him,” said Boudreau. “I’d introduce him to my daughter and ask if he wants to go home.”

While the picture may have led to his discovery, Murphy maintains he was never lost in the first place. “I became famous when I didn’t want to be found,” he said. “I love Victor; he’s a good kid, but here (in Toronto), I’m anonymous . . . Back home, I’m not.”

The city has allowed him to meet all types of new people, compared with his former home in a small, rural Maritime town. That place, Murphy said, is “where everyone knows each other and their grandfather.” But he still loves his relatives, even if they don’t understand his nomadic life.

“They always want to help me,” he said. “They are comfortable with the lifestyle of owning a home, car. But I like living on the outside of that box.”

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Although he may be homeless, Murphy said he’s far from miserable.

“I’m not perfectly content, but no one ever is,” he explained. “Right now, I’m not hurting, I’m not starving, I’m not freezing, but I am content.”

Toronto is home, at least for now. While Murphy plans to trek to Ottawa next year, he won’t soon forget last Thursday night, when he watched the Leafs win 3-1 over the Carolina Hurricanes, from a second-tier seat just above centre ice.

“If it helps me, Michelle and Todd or even the Leafs, that’s a good thing,” he said. “And maybe it will lead to someone else taking another guy to a game sometime.”