Tro’juan Henderson has given more than 800 rides since starting as a Lyft driver in January. His everyday observations of his passengers inspired him to create #TalesFromTheLyft on Twitter and Facebook.

But out of all of the moments he’s shared, one tale from mid-April got thousands talking. On that evening, Henderson received a Lyft request at a downtown Dallas hotel. Two women helped a third woman, who was extremely drunk, get into the car.

“Here’s her key,” one of the women told Henderson.

Henderson grew concerned. He felt uncomfortable with bringing the woman home and getting her into her apartment. But he did want to help get her home safely.

“She’s really incoherent. Is there a reason that you two can’t ride with her? Since this is your friend,” he recalled telling the two women.

He offered to give the friends a ride back to the hotel for free, as long as they got their friend into her apartment. But the two women didn’t want to drive across town with their friend.

So Henderson refused to give the drunk woman a ride. She slept it off in the hotel. He described the incident on a Facebook video and then posted another video on Twitter.

He challenged people to take care of those who are vulnerable. His video went viral, receiving thousands of shares on Twitter and Facebook.

What many don’t know is that this wasn’t just one day of social accountability for Henderson. He has been advocating for women, as well as men, for several years.

But first, he had to become his own advocate.

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Dark moments

Henderson has faced dark moments and challenges starting from birth. But the 28-year-old with shoulder-length dreads and a contagious smile mostly talks about how his challenges came to be blessings in his life.

His mother was in jail and pregnant with Henderson in 1988. Growing up, he spent most of his life in Dallas, with some periods in New Orleans and Austin. His biological mother wasn’t involved in his life, but he occasionally talked to her.

School felt like a bore growing up. Henderson thinks back and admits he doesn’t know how he graduated. His sister was always the overachiever, getting A’s across all subjects.

"No one really expected anything of me," he said. "People would say, 'Tro'juan doesn't apply himself.'"

To support the family, his father juggled several jobs. In the morning, his father would start work at 5:30 a.m. and worked another job until midnight. Typically work weeks stretched six days, but his father would relax by playing music on his day off. Usually it was soul music from the Maze and Frankie Beverly and, occasionally, Tupac’s hip hop.

Listening to Tupac got Henderson hooked on hip hop from The Fugees, whose vocalist Lauryn Hill soothed the afternoons with beats and lyrics from rapper Pras Michel and Wyclef Jean. Other musicians like Nas and Common resonated with him.

“They got a message, but I’m interested in the skill like the way they flip words and pulled me in,” Henderson said.

Tro'juan Henderson poses for a portrait in studio in Dallas on Tuesday, April 18, 2016. Henderson, a 28-year-old Lyft driver, has gone viral after he refused to pick up an intoxicated woman in Dallas. He's an advocate against sexual assault and a spoken word poet. (Vernon Bryant/The Dallas Morning News)

Henderson found that he could similarly flow words with raps. But at 19, he found more respect for the power of words when he saw spoken word poet Taalam Acey perform at an open mic event in Pflugerville.

"With hip hop, what pulled me in was the cadence, the word play and the way they delivered. With poetry, your voice is the instrument," Henderson said.

He added: “I had signed up for that mic night, but I was really intimidated. ‘I’m not going to go up,’ I said. I had never really seen someone’s words, in poetry wise, have some impact.”

But that moment of doubt wouldn’t hinder his chance to shine.

Finding words to heal the pain

In 2009, Henderson got involved with DaVerse Lounge, a place where young adults under 21 could get active with open mic nights and spoken word clubs. Founder Will Richey worked with his friends Darius Frasure and Alejandro Perez, who eventually became influential mentors for Henderson.

"He was a talented lyricist," Richey recalls of seeing Henderson perform the first time. "A handsome guy with a humble voice."

Henderson took the painful moments of life and wrote about abuse in his childhood. He’d questioned the societal expectation of what it meant to be masculine and respecting women.

“There’s some things that will break even the strongest of men down/

For some, it was when you were born and they fold you into toy soldiers/

They will camouflage you in masculinity/"

Open-mic nights at events became less intimidating, and even after slight fumbles, he found he could recover swiftly. “As young people are, they’re looking for a place to express themselves,” Richey said. And the pain and feelings that Henderson would leave on stage got attention.

The unexpected sound of applause and praise encouraged him.

“It was the first time in my life I felt that anyone expected something good of me,” Henderson said.

From the streets to the stage

Even as he performed at DaVerse Lounge, Henderson was struggling to live on a minimum wage and moving from place to place. Then he got desperate. He started stealing.

First it was just small items, under $50. But then he still needed to make more money. He got caught stealing and trying to resell iPod Touches.

“The jobs I was at wasn’t paying enough. I was trying to live on $7.75 an hour and failing college. I don’t have much money to work with,” he said.

One day, Frasure, one of his mentors, pulled him aside. "You can't do both. You can't be out on stage and out in the streets," Henderson said Frasure told him.

“I understood he had a lot going on,” Frasure said later. “It was like a shadow following him. And I know about that shadow. It’s what helps me with these young people.”

Like an older brother, Frasure took Henderson under his wing, and Henderson’s time got so tied up with poetry as he began to lead more events and perform more often.

Tro'juan Henderson (right), a spoken word artist and poet, leads an workshop during Make Art with Purpose at Dallas West Branch Library on Aug. 13, 2016 in Dallas. (Ting Shen/The Dallas Morning News)

Six years later, life hasn’t necessarily gotten easier for Henderson. Today, he works as a Lyft driver to give him the flexibility to perform at poetry events and lead workshops with students at high schools and universities across several cities in Texas.

His dream is to one day be a published poet. But writing new material hasn’t been easy since 2015. He’s felt discouraged during some performances when the applause wasn’t as loud as he hoped and when his thoughts couldn’t come together.

But the public attention that came from his viral moment has pushed Henderson to get back into writing.

“The Lyft thing sparked something,” he said. “I feel a bit more responsibility. I was like, ‘Damn, they’re listening again.’”

At a glance

Tro’juan Henderson will perform spoken word poetry at 7 p.m. May 6, at the Janette Kennedy Gallery, 1409 S. Lamar St., Dallas. The event is free to the public.