Arden Taylor has often gone the extra mile for others. Now loved ones are repaying his kindness and generosity as he copes with a terminal illness.

Arden Taylor--husband, father, lifelong surfer--awoke on Sept. 14 with a horrendous headache. He went to work, but by afternoon the pain was so bad his co-workers called his wife to take him to a local hospital in Ventura. A few days later, at UCLA Medical Center, doctors diagnosed five malignant tumors, four of them inoperable because they are deep inside his brain.

But this is not the story of Taylor’s illness, which, doctors say, is terminal. It is the tale of a life well lived, of a man so committed to friendship, faith and family that in a terrible crisis, he has been wrapped in a cocoon of caring and hope.

In a world where so many people lead semi-isolated lives, where so many believe that security comes from money, the Taylors are benefiting from their lifelong investment in people, reaping riches of friendship and respect that many millionaires might envy.

During the first few months of the family’s crisis, their two sons--Jesse, 12, and Graham, 8--were cared for, their urgent bills paid, their house cleaned, their laundry, shopping and cooking done--all by friends who knew what needed doing, and did it. When wife Laura had to return to work teaching seventh grade, Arden, 42, was driven to and from radiation therapy every day for six weeks by his fellow church members, who set up a computerized driving schedule. The Taylors’ fixer-upper Ventura home, purchased shortly before his illness surfaced, was re-stuccoed and painted by about two dozen men who said they just wanted to help their friend do the work he’d planned on doing.

Arden, a respected building contractor for many years, had so impressed other construction workers that some of them offered to donate materials and time to help finish his house when they heard of his troubles. The family’s pastor, Lance Ralston of Calvary Chapel in Oxnard, has mowed the family’s lawn and helped with the painting.

And on Saturday night, at the Scherr Forum in Thousand Oaks, a small benefit concert was held by yet another group of friends, Arden’s co-workers at Starbucks, where he had been a manager for less than a year before his illness struck.

“We wanted to show our love by raising a little money,” says Lynda Blue, who hired Arden as a store manager in Santa Barbara. The Taylors’ sole income now comes from Laura’s teaching salary.

His illness has been “a great learning experience, a humbling event in my life,” says Arden, who is staying home while undergoing chemotherapy. He had no idea he was so well-liked by so many, he says. He certainly didn’t know how to graciously accept the kind of help from others that he was so used to offering himself.

Laura has been keeping “a scrapbook of blessings” that have occurred since the illness.

“There have been so many little miracles, and I want our family to focus on the positive,” she says. UCLA said it was accepting no more neurosurgery patients, for instance, “but then my husband got in. There were no operating rooms available, and then suddenly one opened up. I keep track of all these things that are blessings.”

Members of the Taylors’ congregation say it has been the same sort of learning experience for them.

“We were always a caring church family” says family friend Jeff Brown of Camarillo. “But things were going so well for everybody . . . a lot of good things were happening to all of us. And in those circumstances, it’s so easy to lose your focus on what’s really important.

“Then this happened to Arden, and we were reminded that there are many things much more important than the next thousand points on the Dow. Things like friendship, family and reaching out to others who may need help. To be surrounded by a loving community that deeply cares and shares the pain you’re feeling--that gives one hope, it gives a sense of peace and a kind of confidence that things will somehow, some way, be OK.”

Still in the eye of the storm that is Arden’s illness, the Taylors are in no position to analyze how they amassed such a treasure trove of friendship. But talk to Arden’s friends and the same words about him keep popping up. Foremost among them: integrity.

“Ask anyone in our church about Arden, and they’ll tell you great things,” Ralston says. “Arden was the general contractor for our new church building, which we moved into a year ago. We chose him despite our policy never to hire anyone just because they are members of our church. We made kind of an exception with him because we so respected his integrity. The project went beautifully. In fact, he made a number of significant contributions to the building that . . . were not part of the original plans, because he knows our church and what we do. He cared enough to do better than his best.”

Church Community

Rallied to the Cause

When they learned of his illness, Ralston says the congregation was “devastated, and there was an immediate response to come alongside the family and provide what was needed. Teams of friends were at the hospital with the Taylors, and others took care of things at their home.”

Close friend Lisa Daniel says so many of the Taylors’ friends have wanted to help and to get news of Taylor’s progress that she started an e-mail list “telling people what the family’s needs are, what his condition is, and what they could pray for. There were dozens of things that needed doing, as you can imagine. For example, doctors at UCLA needed to see test results from the Ventura hospital before they would consider admitting Arden. Friends volunteered to immediately pick up the X-rays and drive them down to Westwood.

“We had two groups of women that took care of the house, one person coordinating the meals, my husband coordinating the house painting. Another church member wrote a living will for them, free of charge. A neighbor across the street always brought warm cookies. Some days people brought two or three full dinners. . . . It’s months later now, and people still keep calling and wanting to help.”

Arden started managing the downtown Santa Barbara Starbucks last January. His headaches began soon thereafter, and he started seeing doctors and chiropractors, none of whom diagnosed anything serious. It wasn’t until September, when he could not get through the day, that they realized something was terribly wrong.

“At first, people from other stores pitched in to help cover his shifts, to make sure he had the time off he needed,” says Blue, district manager of 11 Starbucks locations.

It soon became clear he could not come back immediately, she says. And when he stopped by last month to visit her, she heard firsthand about the radiation and chemotherapy, the endless doctor and hospital visits, the horrible complications from both his illness and its treatments. She wondered, after he left, what would bring “some respite to him and his family from all this horror . . . just a little reprieve, if that is possible.”

Her own husband is an avid surfer, she says. “I know that to be someplace peaceful in a surfing environment is always replenishing for my husband, and I thought, ‘Even if Arden can’t surf right now, maybe going away with his wife to such a place would be good for him.’ I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could send him on a little vacation, where doctors and treatments just don’t exist?’ I had no idea how to raise the money, so I voice-mailed all the stores to ask for suggestions.”

‘It Was an Act

of Pure Love’

Wendy Johnson, a Starbucks employee and acquaintance of Arden’s, volunteered her band, Atticus, to play at the benefit on Saturday. After costs, revenues from the show won’t amount to more than $2,000 at most, Blue knows.

“But it was much better than a bake sale, and it was an act of pure love for Arden,” she says.

The family has not yet decided what it will do with the money.

For Arden, who was used to being strong and independent, it was difficult to accept so much attention and assistance.

“He has come to understand that sometimes we have to set that independence aside and realize that others get blessings through helping us,” says his friend Jeff Daniel.

For now the family is in what Ralston calls “a holding pattern,” waiting to see if a miracle will arise, despite the doctors’ prognosis.

“Our family takes it one day at a time,” Laura says. “I’ve believed this in the past but not practiced it. Nobody is ever promised a tomorrow. You take every day and make it the best it can be.”

Lisa Daniel says she and her husband have discussed with the Taylors the possibility of Arden’s death.

“In our belief, to be in heaven would be the ultimate healing,” she says. “So if he were to die, the loss would be ours, not his. He will either be healed here on Earth, or he will have the ultimate healing in heaven. He strongly believes that.”

Pastor Ralston says “the ongoing issue and challenge is the total uncertainty of the future. God could heal Arden. But will he? It’s what we pray and hope for. But the fact is, all of us are going to go. . . .”

And that immutable fact, says Brown, “is a lesson we’ve all been reminded of. Arden’s strength is an inspiration to us. A year ago, his life seemed normal--a long road that lay ahead of him. Now, even if it should be cut short, he has made his mark. We see how important that is for all of us. Ultimately, all that counts is people. If we can’t invest ourselves in others, then we really can’t invest ourselves in anything that is going to last.”

* For information, contact the Arden Taylor Recovery Fund, in care of Calvary Chapel of Oxnard, 1925 Eastman Ave., Oxnard, CA 93030; (805) 485-0111.

* Bettijane Levine can be reached at bettijane.levine@latimes.com.