BILL SPARKES/Acorn Newspapers SAFETY FIRST— Crossing guard Ray Orsini has been helping schoolchildren and their families cross the street near Justin Elementary in Simi Valley for almost 20 years. Here, Orsini escorts Andrea Prado and her daughter, Cassidy, 5. Leo Borelli started a new career in February 1978.

Borelli and his wife, Lena, moved to Simi Valley that year, fresh from a life of making cole slaw and potato salad, selling candy and cigars.

The retirees had owned several businesses back in Chicago, including one that produced salads for delicatessens and catering businesses and an old-fashioned cigar shop, but they moved here to be closer to their daughter, Sharon, a teacher at Mountain View Elementary School.

With Lena’s blessing, Borelli chose work as a crossing guard. He liked the schedule, which gave him the summers free to frolic with his three grandsons.

Just a few years after settling into their new life, Lena, his wife of 41 years, died. The husbandwife team who until the move had worked together side-by-side every waking hour for three decades was no more.

But Borelli couldn’t sit around for too long being mad at the world: he had to escort his charges across busy Tapo Canyon Road and Township Avenue.

Being a crossing guard has not only given Borelli a reason to keep active, but it’s also been the vehicle for meeting new people.

“I’ve made a lot of good friends in this job,” he said, such as the retired couple who, when driving by, decided to stop and ask the gentle crossing guard to dinner at their house. Several years later, the trio still is eating dinner together regularly. The couple even picks up Borelli, since it’s become difficult for him to drive at night.

Borelli came to his job with crossing guard experience. As a youngster in Chicago, he’d been a patrol boy, stopping the vehicles of the day—there were more horse-drawn buggies than automobiles then, he said—to ensure young children could safely cross the road.

Borelli has become such a trusted fixture in the neighborhood that families have given him keys to their homes so he can use the restroom while they’re away. Others insist he park his car in their driveway for safety. Police officers who often hang out at the intersection refer to him as the finger-pointing crossing guard: when his index finger and the octagon red sign are raised in the air, drivers must stop.

The job has almost made a celebrity out of Borelli. Receptionists make sure his doctor and dentist appointments don’t interfere with his appointed rounds. And children have recognized him at local places and as far away as Disneyland.

The 88-year-old great-grandfather of two, who’s led children across these busy streets for 27 years and now is escorting children who tell him he walked their parents across the street, said this year may be his last. He hasn’t quite made up his mind though.

He said if he retires for a second time, he’ll “lie down and go to sleep.”

Just a few miles west of Borelli’s corner stands another of the city’s long-time sentinels, Ray Orsini. Orsini has for nearly 20 years ensured that children safely cross Justin Avenue and Cochran Street on their way to and from Justin Elementary School.

After retiring from a 30-year career at the General Motors plant in Van Nuys, Orsini moved to Simi Valley. That same year he began working as a crossing guard.

“What I didn’t want to do was sit on a porch in a rocking chair,” Orsini said. “I figured I’d do something and live a little.”

Marian Weaver, principal of Justin Elementary School, said Orsini often has put himself in harm’s way, stepping out in front of cars to protect the children.

“We’re grateful for his courage,” she said.

Orsini said his corner isn’t very busy these days because more and more parents are driving their children to and from school.

Nonetheless, he’s happy. “I enjoy what I do,” said the father of seven and grandfather of 20. “I think that’s important.”

He also enjoys the work schedule: he only works about four hours every school day and gets generous time off for holidays.

And the extra income helps Orsini pay for a gallon or two of gasoline, a round of golf or an occasional dinner out with Eleanor, his wife of 53 years.

It also pays for his Tuesday morning habit of breakfasting with fellow retirees. They call themselves ROMEOs, for Retired Old Men Eating Out. They’ve met at Millie’s Restaurant & Bakery in Simi Valley for the last 10 years. Orsini’s even helped a couple of ROMEOs get jobs as crossing guards.

Will Orsini continue escorting his diminutive charges across busy thoroughfares? “I’m really healthy, so I kind of think I will,” he said. “I like it where I am.”