Glen Warner would go back to work tomorrow if he could.

The 71-year-old Kamloops security guard with Securiguard, a company contracted by the City of Kamloops, was sucker-punched in Riverside Park six days ago by a stranger.

But he had surgery on his face yesterday, and he says it’ll be at least a couple weeks before he can go back to work.

“The surgery went one-hundred per cent. They got the plate in, they put a titanium plate in to hold my eye up. It’s going to be really good. The doctor said it’s going to be about three to five months before I get all the feeling back in my lip and face, because the neuron channels were blocked off and they’re growing back again.

“But that won’t affect my work… I love this job. Like I tell people when I meet them here: what better job could you have, then to get paid to talk to people and hangout in the park?”

Warner says the assailant had called him over, which came after he had asked that person to move along, and he expected that person to apologize.

“But I didn’t even get words out of my mouth, and he just looked at me and said a few vulgarities and told me to ‘hit the road, goof,’ then he smoked me. He didn’t even step back or anything, he just came up and hit me.

“This is one situation where I did not follow my normal procedure. Normally if I’m talking to someone aggressive, I step back and get away. So if you do decide to attack me, I’ve got some ability to come across. But this, I read it wrong, and it just went sideways. That’s all.”

A longtime worker in federal corrections who has since retired, Warner says he wasn’t angry when the assault happened.

“I was just startled at the moment, and actually amused by the look on his face as he rode away. It was like, ‘I just hit that guy and he didn’t fall.” And I’m thinking, okay, that’s good for me. And then I did all my due process, I then came back and I called my boss. So no, I wasn’t angry at all,” he says.

“More disappointed in my decision-making, and disappointed in his reaction. Because I know, you could see in his reaction in the way he was, that there was anger involved. And that’s something nobody should have to live with.”

Warner says he immediately took pictures after the suspect hit him, which was widely shared online in the days afterwards.

A suspect has now been arrested, and Warner says above all he hopes that person gets the help they need.

“He just seemed like a very angry individual. And that’s not good, because that just rots yourself. So if we can get some way of getting him to turn his life around, or something like that, that’s what my goal is down here. I talk to street people and addicts all the time when I’m doing this job down here, and I’ve got a lot of respect from a lot of these guys.”