A Year of Doing Good

by Judith O'Reilly

  After this year of doing good, my faith in the divine is less, but my faith in man is more. And that’s OK – with everyone but God, probably. Then again, I keep coming back to that truth ‘Love thy neighbour’ – without thought of reward, reciprocity, or any hope they will love us back. Because sometimes we don’t get loved back. Perhaps the power of religion lies in the fact that it addresses a fundamental human truth we need to hear. Not that in certain death there is the possibility of resurrection, but that in loving our neighbour we become truly ourselves. Maybe we can’t be good; perhaps, though, we can do good, and perhaps we have to. After all, we have each other to keep us warm, to keep us fed and clothed – whether any God watches over us or not.

  We are the product of our upbringing, of parents who visit the sick and who drive the elderly to church, and I’m glad of that. But did I change the world? Maybe not. Maybe I just changed the way I see my particular world – then again, it’s my world I live in. When I started the year, there was a risk I would get fed up of doing good – but I discovered the reward there is in goodness, and I don’t mean eternal sunshine, but cards and flowers, the pleasure at getting someone a chance, at levelling the playing field just a little. The compliment and boost to your own self-esteem when someone believes your opinion counts, even for no other reason than because you are old and they are young. As too does the affection if you cultivate, rather than ignore, a relationship with someone you might otherwise have dismissed. The thanks, time and time again, for whatever tiny thing you have done to make things better, for the privilege of being able to help, and it is a privilege. Often you do good and you feel good, and I don’t care if it is our own biology and evolution that make it so. And am I happier after a year of doing good? To my surprise, I am.

  My year of good deeds ended up being about more than day after day of opening doors and collecting pennies and tipping dead mice into black bin-bags. My resolution became a quest. My very particular, tiny, nothing-to-write-home-about practical deeds edged me towards some fundamental truth about how, in doing things for each other, we give meaning to ourselves.

  Was my year of doing good self-serving and self-indulgent? Yep. Did I fall short? How shall I list the ways? Did my good deeds fail? Sometimes. Oftentimes. Did I say the wrong thing as well as the right thing, do ill as well as good; should I have done more? You betcha, you betcha, you bet. The little old lady I hardly visited; a friend I never seemed to have the time for; impatience I showed to those who move slower than I do or who refused my help or who wouldn’t get involved – as was their absolute right; the fact I didn’t get Karl a job, that I didn’t say to my parents, ‘Come live with me right this moment.’ But to my surprise I have discovered that some among us live good lives, the best of lives, and I rejoice in them and for them. Because when I looked closer, my friends were more than my friends. They were the most admirable of people. Ordinary lives made extraordinary in how they are lived.

  No, I am not a better person. I am as flawed as I ever was. I am someone who did 365 good deeds, is all. Maybe more than 365, as I appear to have acquired a habit – despite myself. To date the Jam Jar Army has raised more than £20,000 for charity, including nearly £6,000 (and counting) for a local youth theatre; £800 for the Humber inshore rescue service through Sainsbury’s in Hull; £400 for London’s homeless, collected by CQS; and £240 collected by Derwentside Mind. Cryssie’s writing lessons went on, while the other day a woman dropped her leather glove at the railway station and, all unknowing, chatting to her pal, trit-trotted up the concrete slope of the ironwork bridge and over the tracks. Standing on the concourse, my eyes narrowed as I eyed the offending glove. I wanted to leave the station. I fought the urge to pick it up. I willed my fellow travellers to spot the glove and carry it across the bridge to the woman. No one did. Cursing, I broke off from the call I was making on my mobile, picked up the glove and crossed the bridge.

  There are as many meanings to life as there are people in this world. Our life’s work is to give meaning to our own lives. But it is true to say that in kindness, respect and in generosity to each other, a certain beauty is lent to our own lives, some kind of joy. In those things, there is meaning. In doing good there is meaning. In loving the right person, in the right way, at the right time, there is meaning. In loving at all, there is meaning. In losing those whom we love, there is meaning. In failure, there is meaning. Life, after all, is in the detail. Life is in the good we do each other.

  As for my New Year’s resolution this year? Something simpler.

  To get younger?

  To get thinner?

  To grow taller?

  I can do that.

  Top Tips for Doing Good Deeds

  Pick up the phone and call someone who you suspect may need to talk. Illness, isolation, grief. We can’t make everything better; then again, who says we can’t try?

  A kind word costs nothing.

  Warning: a good deed can take time. But in these recessionary days, sometimes time is all we have to give each other.

  Treat yourself. Good deeds are often rewarded with thanks, flowers and smiles. Even if they aren’t, they are often a reward in themselves. Don’t let the usual good-deed doers keep that sense of satisfaction all to themselves.

  If you yourself are in need of a pick-me-up, do something for someone else. ‘This really works,’ as the adverts used to say.

  You don’t need to be a millionaire philanthropist (if you are reading this and you are a millionaire philanthropist, write a cheque, mate); you can, however, start collecting coppers and silver in a jam jar, and when it’s full, take it in to a charity. Pennies make pounds. Pennies make a difference. You make a difference.

  Pick up a piece of litter.

  Support the young in their ambitions. You have more wisdom than they do: don’t waste it. Use it on their behalf. After all, what goes around comes around: those who are helped will help others in their turn.

  Use your particular skills and talents. No one says a good deed is a big deed – it is OK to think small. You don’t have to commit to working a day a week in a charity shop, but try to use what talents you have to help someone else.

  Grab an opportunity. If you think you could do a good turn, you are probably right.

  Bear in mind that occasionally the good deed might not work out, despite your best intentions, and you might fail. That’s OK. Next time, you’ll succeed, and remember sometimes it is less about the outcome and more about the effort.

  Appreciate someone for what they do for you or what they do for someone else. Notice them. Thank them. They’re worth it.

  It’s never too late.

  Doing Good by Numbers

  Good deed Number of times accomplished

  Working on the Jam Jar Army 44

  Giving a gift 29

  Showing kindness to a stranger 28

  Mentoring the young 27

  Supporting a good cause 25

  Doing a favour for a neighbour 22

  Using contacts/professional skills for someone else 19

  Bereavement support 17

  Charitable giving 16

  Consoling/assisting/giving a treat to a child (who is not mine) 16

  Helping out another parent 15

  Hospitality and care 15

  Teaching a disabled teenager to write 15

  Helping newcomers settle 12

  Supporting friends with parenting challenges 9

  Volunteering 9

  Supporting the sick 8

  Listening 7

  Visiting/phoning/kindness to the elderly 7

  Going the extra mile for parents 6

  Showing kindness to a friend 5

  Picking up litter 4

  Attending a burial 3

  Giving help in an emergency 2

  Lending the car 2

  Writing letters for others 2

  Looking for a lost dog 1

  Charities Featured in This Book

  Alnwick Garden Trust: http://www.alnw
ickgarden.com/

  Barnardo’s: http://www.barnardos.org.uk/

  Berwick CAB: http://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/

  Daft as a Brush: http://www.daftasabrush.org.uk/

  Derwentside Mind: http://www.derwentsidemind.co.uk/

  Humber Rescue: http://www.humber-rescue.org.uk/

  League of Friends of the Alnwick Hospitals

  Macular Disease Society: http://www.maculardisease.org/

  Mark Wright Project: http://themarkwrightproject.org.uk/

  Missionaries of Charity of Mother Teresa of Calcutta Trust

  North Northumberland Hospice: http://www.hospicecare-nn.org.uk/

  RNLI: http://www.rnli.org.uk/

  Salvation Army: http://www.salvationarmy.org.uk/

  Bibliography

  Adams, Robert Merrihew, A Theory of Virtue ( Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).

  Aristotle, The Nichomachean Ethics, translated by David Ross, with an introduction by Lesley Brown (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).

  Barnardo, Mrs, and James Marchant, Memoirs of the Late Dr Barnardo (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1908).

  Brawer, Dr Naftali, A Brief Guide to Judaism (London: Robinson, 2008).

  Dawkins, Richard, The Selfish Gene (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).

  Dunbar, Robin, Louise Barrett and John Lycett, Evolutionary Psychology (Oxford: Oneworld, 2011).

  Flint, Thomas P., and Michael C. Rea (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).

  Grayling, A. C., What is Good? (London: Phoenix, 2007).

  Jacobson, Simon, Toward a Meaningful Life: The Wisdom of the Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson (New York: HarperCollins, 2004).

  Kolodiejchuk, Brian (ed.), Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light (New York: Rider, 2008).

  Lewis, C. S., The Screwtape Letters (London: HarperCollins Publishers, 2002).

  London Gazette, number 58182, 15 December 2006, supplement no. 1.

  Luks, Allan, and Peggy Payne, The Healing Power of Doing Good (Lincoln, NE: iUniverse, Inc., 2001).

  MacIntyre, Alasdair, After Virtue (London: Bristol Classic Press, 2011).

  Nesbitt, Eleanor, Sikhism: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005).

  Panza, Christopher, and Adam Potthast, Ethics for Dummies (Indianapolis: Wiley, 2010).

  Post, Stephe, The Hidden Gifts of Helping (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2011).

  Post, Stephen, and Jill Neimark, Why Good Things Happen to Good People (New York: Broadway Books, 2007).

  Robinson, David, and Chris Garratt, Introducing Ethics (London: Icon Books, 2008).

  Tutu, Desmond, and Mpho Tutu, Made for Goodness (New York: Rider, 2010).

  Acknowledgements

  As ever, my friendship and thanks to the extraordinarily talented Venetia Butterfield of Viking, who refuses to let me overwrite even though I beg her, and the dynamic and talented team at Penguin. I am deeply grateful to Caroline Pretty, my copy-editor, who makes everything seem better than it is, and to Kirsty Howarth for bearing with me.

  Thanks as well to my agent Patrick Walsh, who is always in my corner, and his clever, energetic colleagues at Conville and Walsh.

  I am grateful to all those already mentioned in the book who were generous enough to share their expertise, advice and time and whose reputations in their respective fields go before them. I owe a particular debt of thanks to my sometime theological advisers Father Ed Hone, Dr Robert Song (Durham University) and Rabbi Dr Naftali Brawer (Spiritual Capital Foundation); as well as to my brother-in-law Dr Rob McCall and Dr Malcolm Bates, who tried their best to keep me right on the science. Any mistakes are mine and not those of my expert advisers. A special hat-tip to my first readers, Sophie Atkinson, John Woodman, Father Ed and Malcolm, for their friendship and insights; to Abigail Bosanko for her wisdom; and to Sue Brooks and Andrew Macdonald for everything.

  During this year I was privileged to meet many good-deed doers, some of whom feature in this book and some of whom don’t. Credit must go to the team at HospiceCare North Northumberland; Paul Larkin and his staff at the Northumberland Gazette; Julie Harris; and Michael Hintze, Michael Rummel and Sarah Hands at CQS. I am particularly aware of the trust placed in me by some of my favourite people, who have been brave enough to share their personal stories of good-deed doing (and of difficult times) – you know who you are (or maybe not, now I have changed the names). To all my good-deed enablers, my beloved friends and family, and to those who bore patiently with my obsession with jam jars (most of all my husband and children), I salute you.

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  First published 2013

  Copyright © Judith O’Reilly, 2013

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  Cover photograph: © Getty Images

  All rights reserved

  Grateful acknowledgement is made to the Estate of Edgar A. Guest for permission to reprint lines from his poem ‘Miss Me But Let Me Go’

  ISBN: 978-0-67-092114-0

  JUDITH O’ REILLY

  WIFE IN THE NORTH

  Maybe hormones ate her brain.

  How else did Judith’s husband persuade her to give up her career and move from her belove
d London to Northumberland with two toddlers in tow?

  Pregnant with number three, Judith is about to discover that there are one or two things about life in the country that no one told her about: that she’d be making friends with people who believed in the four horsemen of the apocalypse; that running out of petrol could be a near-death experience; and that the closest thing to an ethnic minority would be a redhead.

  Judith tries to do that simple thing that women do: make hers a happy family. A family that might live happily ever after. Possibly even up North …

  ‘Funny, poignant and beautifully written’ Lisa Jewell

  ‘Genuinely funny and genuinely moving’ Jane Fallon, author of Getting Rid of Matthew

  ‘I howled with laughter, tears of recognition at every page’ Jenny Colgan

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