My wife and I went to Oregon last weekend to attend a memorial service for one of her cousins. We anticipated a small gathering of “older” relatives including his children and those of us in the “over seventy” group of cousins. It turned out to be a memorial put on by the local police department and included about 60 towns folks – including a mix of officers and people from around town. The police blocked off the street in front of the police station, set up folding chairs in the middle of the street, with a nice presentation area backed by flags, flowers and a shiny white police cruiser.

While this cousin was close to my wife in age, we knew little about his life because he distanced himself from the family about 40 years ago. We knew generally where he was, a bit about what he was doing, but almost nothing else. Because of this, most of what learned that day was new to us and more than a little unexpected.

A very brief story of his life includes growing up on a very rural farm in northern California, having a father that left the family at an early age, moving to Canada to live with his mother and her new husband, fighting as a Navy Seal in Vietnam and have a career as a prison guard in several prisons in California (including Alcatraz). It seems that his experience as a Navy Seal left him as a pretty troubled individual, probably with significant PTSD – accounting for his estrangement from his extended family over the years. Sometime within the past 20 years or so he was no longer a guard and was living somewhere in Oregon. About two years ago my wife found out that he was very ill, found his address and started an irregular snail-mail correspondence with him – enough to inform us where he was living and that he had become extremely ill, leading to his recent death.

The new information that we heard that day was completely unexpected. The “rest of the story” was that he moved to a small coastal town eleven years ago. After moving to town he took up a personal project of cleaning the trash from around town. Walking, or riding a three-wheel bicycle, picking up trash along the roads and in the parks. His stated purpose was he was doing that because he wanted to live in a clean town, and that trash attracts trash, so he spent his days changing that situation. The police noticed and because worried about him working near traffic, so they offered him a reflective vest to at least enhance his visibility. He refused it at first because he didn’t like the “image” that created – until they offered him one with the words, “Do Good” on the back. He accepted that and came to be known as “Do Good Jerry.”

While picking up trash, he also met people – often people having difficult times in their lives. People walking their dogs, or sitting on a park bench, or having a cup of coffee at the local coffee house. He got to know many people, being a bit of a expected “fixture” who people could depend upon for a little chat, a little cheering up, or a compassionate ear.

After a year or so of this, he decided he needed to do more than just pick up trash (perhaps he had cleaned the town?). One day he went to the police department and offered his services, free of charge, to help with anything they needed help with.

They started by offering him menial tasks such as cleaning rooms, dealing with the trash and things like that. After a bit they found that he could easily talk to the prisoners; offering advice, listening to their stories, and just being friends. He was allowed to take them into the exercise yard and play basketball or whatever. Soon he was taking small groups of prisoners for walks around town – walking five or six miles around the docks, along the river, or into parks. He became a confidant and trusted friend to them, and to the officers. Offering suggestions about how to avoid returning to the jail after being released, and how to live a more “normal” and peaceful life. As time went on the department outfitted him with things including a uniform, a badge, handcuffs, allowed him to carried his own gun, and finally they provided him with a car (the one parked behind the “alter” at the service).

His “normal” shift started at 6:00 am and ended at 8:00 pm – beginning the day by washing the car. He could “work” all of these hours because he wasn’t an employee and therefore didn’t have to abide by legal requirements concerning shifts, overtime, or anything like that. He just was there when he felt like it and did what needed to be done – apparently he felt like it most of the time. The sheriff spoke of a time when he chastised Jerry for working so hard sincel he didn’t get paid for anything. Jerry’s response was that it was the best job of his life.

The “talks” during his memorial service were amazing little vignettes provided by local folks that he encountered on his daily exercises of “doing good.” They spoke of things such as him hanging out at the shopping center parking lot on hot days to make sure that dogs left in cars were safe, and to make sure that everyone was being careful of the heat. There were stories about him sitting and listening to people’s stories and troubles, helping them when help was most needed. Sad little stories, touching moments. Clearly stories with great appreciation and caring by many of the local folks from all walks of life without consideration of social status or life situations.

It was a really touching and impactful memorial service for me. Here was someone who had clearly led a troubled life, perhaps unhappily (or not – I will never know) – who found a way to quiet whatever demons he had and instead put his focus on the task of “Do Good” without expectations of reward, honor, or even being noticed. He was of course noticed, and clearly he was highly honored as evidenced by the stories at the memorial – but it was also clear that was not the reason for his actions. I feel that his actions were pure – he decided he wanted to dedicate his life to helping in whatever form that might take. Perhaps that was always his main goal – even when deeply involved in the life as a Seal in a terrible war.

I ended up finding a very powerful life lesson that day. Why don’t we all take that view of life and our roles? If we focused on doing good, rather than whatever it is that drives our individual lives, that might be the cure for all of the myriad of troubles in the world. It could inform our decisions about whether the “profits” achievable are the results of doing something good, or doing something that results in harm (to people, the environment, society, each other). Maybe all that is needed to fix the problems is for us all to embrace the goal of doing good. Then we could discuss options in a rational way, rather than in a political divided way. Perhaps we could avoid doing some things that have the potential for generating great profits (and wealth), but do so at the expense of depleting and invading the shared “commons” (shared resources). Perhaps this point of view could inform our decision making so that we protect the environment and each other, rather than treating everything as a “resource” to be used (and used up).