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Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend January 9, 2006 Asante hospice volunteer Donald Sorum, left, visits with White City resident Vern Houk, who is suffering from lung disease. Sorum has volunteered with Asante Hospice for 14 years. Hometown hero As an Asante hospice volunteer for 14 years, Donald Sorumhas provided the comfort of a kind heart for those in need of ... A lasting friend By JOHN DARLING for the Mail Tribune The job of a hospice volunteer — to be a friend to the dying — requires patience and compassion, and for 14 years Donald Sorum has brought those qualities to his work with Asante Hospice. "It’s about bringing support and companionship, talking, maybe playing cards and being ready for anything," says Asante hospice volunteer coordinator Karin Guy, who presented a Hall of Fame Award to Sorum. "Donald does that, with a big heart and a kind soul. I couldn’t do my job without him." Eschewing any laurels for his labors, Sorum says his work with patients such as White City resident Vern Houk, who is in the grips of lung disease, is a process of being present and listening, letting patients talk about issues big and small — and finding experiences and tastes they have in common, like living in Berkeley many decades ago and watching Pan Am’s China Clipper seaplanes take off over the Golden Gate Bridge, which Houk’s dad helped build. "We chat about things we’ve done and the lay of the land, the Rogue Valley, what an inspiration it is, so beautiful — and why so many people, like myself, have come back here after many years," says Houk. "Often I sit there and say nothing," Sorum says. "Other times the patient needs to resolve emotional issues he can’t resolve with his spouse and he wants a man to do ‘man talk’ with. Advertisement "Some do a very thorough job of going back over their lives. I don’t interfere and ask questions. I listen and learn things." Hospice volunteers don’t provide any medical help. But sometimes they seem to bring about miracles, such as the time Sorum was volunteering with an Alzheimer’s patient who was considered unresponsive and uncommunicative. After learning she had a lifelong passion for cats, Sorum brought her picture books of the animals. "She opened up, she conversed. We thought she was dying before that," says Guy. "But we ended up discharging her, because she was no longer appropriate for hospice. I don’t know if that would have happened if Donald wasn’t there. The patients just love him." A widower and retired architectural draftsman living in Ashland, Sorum, 79, put in 600 volunteer hours last year, or about 12 hours a week, including board meetings — that’s four times the average volunteer’s time. Most volunteers have one patient. Sorum has two and has seen as many as four in a week. He got into the work after attending WinterSpring, the bereavement group, when his wife, Betty, died in 1990. They have two daughters who live in the Bay Area. Sorum and other volunteers provide another key service, that of respite for partners and family of dying people. "I work and can’t be here all the time," said Houk’s wife, Ranee. "I know I can always call Donald and that’s wonderful. I worry when I’m gone about Vern falling down or his oxygen tube being kinked, which has happened." Sorum observes, "The rewards are emotional, not financial. You can make a very meaningful difference for the family with very little effort. One time, the wife was exhausted, her hair a mess and her face drawn, from being sole caretaker. I was there four hours while she went out for lunch with a friend, bought a blouse and had her hair done. When she got home, her husband stood up and hugged her. He hadn’t seen her look that good in months. And all I did was sit." But mainly, says Guy, hospice is about listening and letting the dying reflect on the sweep of their lives with a trusted friend and "to look at the next stage of life, that of dying." How does Sorum manage to put in 50 hours a month doing this volunteer work? "They need someone and I just say yes. I don’t have anything else demanding on my time. I get satisfaction out of it and it just seems right." John Darling is a freelance writer living in Ashland. E-mail him at [email protected]. Suggest a hero Do you know someone who's a Hometown Hero? The first to volunteer when a school or a local family needs help, or someone who has risked his personal safety or financial security to help someone else? Submit suggestions to Mail Tribune reporter Sanne Specht via e-mail at A lasting friend ">[email protected] or by phone at 776-4497. 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