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“Senior living” is not an oxymoron. Hardly. In fact, the Pleasanton community is filled with active seniors who are living their days quite fully and well, enjoying time with family and friends, traveling, and engaging in sporting activities and other personal endeavors and hobbies.
And then there are those seniors who do even more, by choosing to pursue meaningful volunteer activities that align with their personal interests, skills, passions and causes, and confer substantial benefits upon others in the community.
Volunteering gives these seniors a heightened sense of purpose in their lives, and a feeling of continued connection to the town.
Seniors report that volunteering is also a great way for them to remain engaged, both mentally and physically, as they age, and that they feel tremendous personal gratification, satisfaction and pride, knowing that their actions and deeds are helping others, and, they feel true joy when they see the positive impacts their efforts make on others’ lives.
Indeed, many believe volunteering enhances their longevity and quality of life, improves their overall physical health, and bolsters their emotional well-being. Senior volunteers also often serve as inspiration for others; their actions set an example for their children, grandchildren, friends, and even strangers, who may choose to similarly get involved in volunteer work that helps to improve the lives of others.
James Howard, a Pleasanton senior and retired clinical psychologist for the Department of Veterans Affairs, embraces volunteering. Howard gathers, fixes and reconditions bicycles for school-aged kids, as well as for Pleasanton’s Muslim Community Center’s Refugee Outreach Program.
He first became interested in repairing and restoring bicycles as a young child, growing up in a working-class neighborhood of Detroit, where parents did not just buy their children a new bicycle when their bike broke. Instead, kids like Howard had to learn to repair their broken bicycles so that they would be able to use them for several years.
According to Howard, the older boys in the neighborhood would teach the younger boys how to make necessary repairs, like fixing flat tires and broken gears, and replacing worn parts like brake pads and cables. Those boys, in turn, as they got older, would teach even younger boys. They all loved the freedom, empowerment and independence that cycling gave them, to travel wherever they wanted to go, either as a group or on their own.
The bicycles Howard personally restores in retirement and provides to the schools are given to students as “rewards” to incentivize those who need some extra motivation to work hard and do well.
He said he does this because he recalls growing up with other young Black boys whom he thought were actually smarter than he was but who did not do as well in school (Howard was placed in the classes with the “smart white kids” while his buddies were not) because their teachers believed them to be unmotivated and unwilling to learn. In Howard’s family his parents — both college graduates — were strong advocates for their children and demanded that they do well academically, regardless of what some teachers thought of them.
As for the Muslim Community Center’s outreach program, which operates as non-denominational and offers assistance to anyone/everyone in need, Howard is on a team that helps to restore bicycles that the program then provides to refugees as a means of transportation. These bicycles enable the refugees to get to and from their jobs, as well to other places they need to go in order to create a better life for themselves and their families here in the Bay Area.
Howard finds it very gratifying to be able to provide to others the same sense of liberty and self-reliance that he knows from his own experience, a working bicycle brings. Additionally, he said that keeping himself busy with an activity he finds so rewarding helps him navigate his way through retirement and stave off depression and other negative phenomena associated with aging. More information about the center’s programs, which are always in need of volunteers, can be found at mcceastbay.org/bike-donation.
Tamra Girvan, another Pleasanton senior, has spent over eight years volunteering as a court-appointed special advocate (CASA) for children in the Alameda County foster care system.
For children in this complex system, a trusted mentor and advocate can be tremendously helpful. The county recruits, trains and supports dedicated volunteers to be a consistent, stable force in a foster child’s life — a person they can rely on for compassion, guidance, advocacy, information, and to speak up for them when necessary.
CASAs like Girvan come from all walks of life and dedicate about 12 hours a month toward helping a foster child. Although being a CASA involves only a two-year commitment, the unique relationship between a foster child and their CASA forges bonds that often last into a foster child’s adulthood, years after they have aged out of the system.
Girvan said she became interested in volunteering as a CASA because she often felt lonely as a child and was eager to help other youths from feeling that way. She has been a CASA for multiple foster youth over the years, including “Jasmine J” for whom she became a CASA when Jasmine was in eight grade. Jasmine recently graduated, with honors, from college.
Only 3% to 4% of children in the foster care system become college graduates. Jasmine said that Girvan has been “such a stable source of support for me and I am so glad we were put together. She has advocated for me in court, answered late night phone calls, been a shoulder for me to cry on, and has been there to celebrate my accomplishments, and motivate me through failures.”
According to Jasmine, Girvan even took on the challenging process to become a temporary foster parent for her when her current foster parents gave her two weeks’ notice to move out of the home while she was still a minor. “I will forever be so grateful for all she has done for me. She is not only my CASA worker, but someone I can call family,” Jasmine said.
Girvan sees the youths assigned to her at least once a week. While they are together, typical activities include having a meal at a casual restaurant, going for walks in a park, catching a movie, going to Meadowlark Dairy for an ice cream cone, and occasionally going shopping at Target.
She finds this type of volunteer work tremendously rewarding because “CASAs help give foster youth the voice they deserve and the hope and consistency they desperately need to make it through the foster system and go on to live a good and productive life. Of all of the various volunteer activities I engage in, being a CASA is my favorite because I feel it makes the greatest impact.”
Girvan said she would be thrilled for other seniors in the community, or even just a single one of them, to get involved with the CASA program because it will give them the same opportunities to truly make a positive impact on the lives of at-risk children.
Currently, there are more than a thousand youth in the Alameda County foster care system, but only about 200 CASAs advocating on their behalf. Girvan said she would love to see that ratio improve. More information about the CASA program can be found at casaofalamedacounty.org.
Howard and Girvan are illustrative of the benefits of volunteering, and how there are numerous opportunities throughout the community to get involved, to meet and become friends with new people, to develop new skills, to feel fulfilled, and to combat feelings of isolation or loneliness that can arise.
Seniors looking for volunteer opportunities may consider becoming a docent/tour guide at a local landmark they enjoy, or volunteering at a food bank, house of worship, animal shelter, senior center or library.
Becoming a tutor or mentor to a young student is also a way to volunteer as it is an activity that goes far beyond the subject matter involved; older people, on account of their age and life experiences, have a lot of acquired wisdom to impart to today’s youth. The ability for a child and a senior to connect is beneficial for the additional reason that it fosters intergenerational respect for one another.
Other volunteer activities to consider might be joining local efforts to clean/maintain parks, beaches and other areas in need of a helping hand, or lending specific expertise in areas like technology and engineering from which others can learn. There are also several websites that help seniors find volunteer opportunities based upon location such as volunteermatch.org or createthegood.aarp.org.
Reaching out to local organizations (schools, hospitals, shelters, senior centers, etc.) over their websites is also a good departure point in terms of finding just the right volunteer role. Opportunities are abundant, with each one providing a chance to really get involved and do some local good.
