It seems that some of the nicest people volunteer for Habitat.  Dennis Navin volunteers at the HabiStore and he is one of the nicest people.  He and his wife Ellen moved to Tucson three years ago from Albany, New York.  There he worked in the construction field after leaving the military.  No school for him…he left that for his wife, who has her Master’s of Education and who worked at Excelsior College as a student advisor.  Dennis said, “During the ‘60s in Albany all you had to do was show up at a construction site and they threw money at you!”  He worked construction all along the East Coast until his entrepreneurial spirit took over and in 1990 he started his own electrical business from which he later retired.  He and Ellen planned on moving to Florida, but with all those hurricanes it scared them off.  After visiting Ellen’s cousin in Tucson they decided to come here.  Tucson took some adjustment, because it’s not quite as green as Florida, but after three years they love it here.  Dennis says that during retirement he was going to play golf all day and shoot craps at the casinos, but after a year of that he felt he needed to “find his purpose again.”

Seeking some purpose Dennis answered an ad for HabiStore volunteers and has been there ever since.  Dennis really likes his coworkers, looks forward to seeing them, and enjoys their interactions. He also said he likes being trusted to make decisions that help people.  The HabiStore is fast paced, always changing and different everyday.  Dennis also volunteers for Senior Services at TMC where he meets with patients to make certain that they can be returned home safely and with any special assistance they may require.  Sometimes he just listens to them, for as long as they want to talk.  It seems that the senior men want to talk mostly about their time in the military.  The women talk about their grandchildren.  Frequently they want to talk about what is happening to them in the hospital, their anxieties and fears apparent to Dennis. He says he stays and listens as long as they want.  Sometimes all it takes is listening at the HabiStore too.  When asked if there was any one experience that exemplified his experiences at HabiStore he told a story.  Two church ladies came in looking for tables for their meeting room.  Dennis found them three tables, perfect size, perfect color, perfect except they only had $50, and each table was exactly $50.  Dennis listened to them confer with each other about how much they needed these tables for their church and heard the disappointment in their voices that they couldn’t afford these perfect tables.  He asked the manager to help, and explained the situation.  Apparently the manager listened too because he gave those church ladies the tables.  Dennis says of Habitat that, “we’re here to help people.  It’s all about generosity.  We all help to keep the ball rolling in the right direction.”

Dennis still gets in that occasional game of golf, and occasional trip to the casinos, but who would have guessed that a retired electrician from Albany would find his purpose listening to people in Tucson, Arizona?

Interviewed and Written by Volunteer Teresa Terry