A Gift for Giving : Efforts by a Young Volunteer Help Save a Life

A heart attack struck Dorothy Gilson as swiftly as an early morning intruder.

Temporarily paralyzed, she worried that she would lie in her bed for days, unnoticed and alone, unable to help herself.

“I was very scared, because I didn’t have a phone in the bedroom,” she said.

If not for Jose Rodriguez, 20, Gilson might have spent her last moments alone.

As a staff volunteer with a city-sponsored program that calls shut-ins to check on their welfare, Rodriguez was working the phones that Saturday in August when no one answered at Gilson’s Pico Rivera house.

He became alarmed. He knew Gilson pretty well, because as a teen-age volunteer, he shopped for her groceries each week. He called again. Still no answer.

“I kept thinking, ‘When they don’t hear me answer, they’ll come,’ ” Gilson said. “It was a big comfort.”

Rodriguez called a neighbor who found Gilson on her bed, conscious but unable to move. Meanwhile, Rodriguez called paramedics who then took Gilson to the hospital. Within a week she was back at home and feeling fine, she said.

“I can’t say I know a whole lot of young people,” Gilson said. “But if you read the newspaper and watch TV, I’d have to say (Jose) is real different from the rest.”

Rodriguez shrugs off the comparison. “I’m no different from any of the people my age who volunteer with the program,” he said.

Two years ago, Rodriguez’s exceptional volunteer work led him to Washington, where he accepted a Congressional Award Medal, the highest tribute Congress gives to the nation’s youth for volunteer work.

Rodriguez started volunteering at age 14 in another city program aimed at helping the elderly. In that weekly program, Rodriguez went shopping for Gilson, did yard work and sometimes came by just to chat about her family, her health and her dog.

A student of computer information systems at Cal Poly Pomona, Rodriguez spends more time studying, so he has less time to do volunteer work. But you can still find him early Saturday morning, calling Gilson and others to make sure they are all right.

“I volunteer because I like to give,” Rodriguez said. “Volunteering isn’t going to change the world, but if we can help a little, well, every little bit helps.”

After he graduates, he hopes to be able to do more. “What I’d really like to do someday,” he said, “is create software to help humanity.”

Barbara Smythe, the city supervisor of senior services, described Rodriguez as remarkable. Though all of the 80 or so teen-agers she works with in the program defy the stereotype of violent urban youths, she said, Rodriguez stands above the rest.

“Jose is unique,” she said. “He’s a leader. He’s intelligent, goal-oriented, focused, charming. He’s an extremely pleasant person to be around.”

Behind Rodriguez’s achievements are supportive parents. “He comes from a fine family,” Smythe said. “He’s got a younger brother who’s following in his footsteps, so I think he’s got some good parenting.”

Like Gilson, the Rodriguez family lives in Pico Rivera. But the two families’ histories are quite different. Gilson moved to Pico Rivera from the Midwest during World War II, into its first housing tract, she said. The Rodriguez family came to an urbanized city several decades later, immigrants from the state of Jalisco in Mexico, looking for a better way of life.

Since World War II, Pico Rivera has become a predominantly Latino working-class suburb, “a stable community, where people go to church, go to the VFW, join community organizations,” said Smythe. “It’s more like a town in the Midwest, with good, solid values.”

Values are very important in the Rodriguez family, said Rodriguez’s father Simon. The elder Rodriguez, a factory worker, and his wife, Monica, a homemaker, have made their two sons a priority.

“We’ve spent a lot of time with them and have been very close with them. We never left them alone. We give them guidance. We’ve sacrificed a lot for them, and now we’re seeing the results,” he said. “Maybe they can be an example for other boys.”

The Rodriguezes taught their children the importance of helping others. “Life is not only the house, it’s the community too,” the elder Rodriguez said. “To build a good family, you must also take care of people in the community.”

Jose credits his parents for helping him. “My parents taught me it’s not what you get out of something, but what you put into it. I was brought up with the philosophy that if you work hard, rewards will come.

“Every time I go to mow a lawn, pull weeds, trim a tree or just talk, I’m making (the seniors) see the world isn’t lonely; that the world does care about them. That’s what we strive for. To keep older adults in the home, so they don’t have to go into institutions.’

Gilson hopes never to live in an institution. And though a grandson has invited her to live with him, she steadfastly refuses. “Not unless I get to the point where I can’t take care of myself,” she said. “I’m very independent, and I’m not going to change.’

Rodriguez admires Gilson’s strong will, he said. It’s people like her who keep him volunteering.

“My younger brother Armando used to ask me all the time why I’d give up every Saturday morning. And now that he’s doing it, he knows why. Because it’s really fun. Because of the seniors. They don’t fit the stereotype: They’re not groggy. They’re not complaining. Their houses don’t smell. It’s like you’re going with your friends to have fun.”