Lori Gilbert: Volunteering side-by-side is special gift for Stockton mother, daughter

May 11-- May 11--Diana Costa no doubt will make some gesture in honor of her mom, Connie Fox, today, Mother's Day.

The Stockton woman doesn't need a national holiday, however, to let her mom know how special she is.

She does it on a regular basis by donating her time to Hospice of San Joaquin, just like her mother.

At the organization's recent Volunteer Recognition Luncheon, Costa and Fox were honored for 2,000 hours of volunteer service, the only mother-daughter team to achieve that mark.

"That was exciting. I was real proud of that," Fox said.

Fox began volunteering at Hospice of San Joaquin in 1999.

"They took care of my husband for about six months," Fox said of Donald, her late husband of 48 years. "I put my name in to pay them back for the way they took care of my husband."

Fox had done clerical work throughout her career, her last stop with a fraternal insurance organization called Royal Neighbors, which not only sells life insurance but is involved in community service. She offered to help hospice in any way she could, and while much of her work is clerical, it's not exclusively so.

From answering mail to writing notes of thanks to helping at Camp Caterpillar for children or manning check-ins for the fundraising poker run motorcycle ride, Fox, 88, has made herself available for 20 years.

When Costa retired from a salvage metal and recycling company, friends she'd met through various chambers of commerce offered suggestions where she could donate her time.

"I knew I wanted to volunteer somewhere," Costa said. "I retired June 30 of 2015 and in July my mother brought me down here. I filled out paper work, had some training and they put me to work in August. I've been volunteering ever since."

Mostly, Costa does data input and helps with mailings. Like her mother, however, she pitches in wherever there's a need, including making gift baskets for families at the holidays or for nurses in recognition of Nurse Appreciation Week, which ends Sunday .

Her biggest job is inputting information for the organization's Tree of Lights, a major fundraising event held every December. People donate for lights to honor loved ones, and the lights are strung on a tree at San Joaquin Delta College. That work, Costa said, is a full-time job from October through November.

It helped account for 500 hours of service in her first year at hospice.

"You had as many hours in your first year as I had in my first seven," Fox said.

Like her mom, Costa wanted to give back to Hospice because of how it had helped her loved one.

"When I first came here, the nurse who took care of him was still here," Costa said.

Costa, 64, and her brother, James, grew up seeing their parents give of themselves.

Connie Fox served as secretary of the California Fraternal Congress, now called the California Fraternal Alliance, made up of fraternal organizations throughout the state.

"She was secretary of that for a number of years," Costa said. "That's how she was so active with so many clubs doing so many things."

Donald Fox, who worked in the mailroom of The Stockton Record until 1992, was "the neighborhood dad."

"When he was retired, all the kids in the neighborhood would go to him to fix their bikes or fix this or fix that," Costa said. "He'd loan out his tools and never cared if he got them back.

"My parents were always helping people, helped family with money or whatever they needed."

Connie Fox lives in the same Country Club neighborhood home where she and Donald raised her children. Costa and her husband, Manuel, live in a home a block over, their back yards connected with a gate between them.

Mother and daughter also volunteer at St. Bernadette's Church, but hospice is special to them.

Costa has put in significant hours four years. Fox has been a steady presence, so much so, that hospice nominated her and she earned a Susan B. Anthony Award in February for community service.

But one of Fox's proudest achievements is Diana, and introducing her to the joy of volunteering for hospice.

"I wasn't sure she'd like it or even do it," Fox said. "She's a pretty strong young woman."

"Stubborn, in other words," Costa laughed.

"I didn't know if she'd like it, but in another sense, I knew she would because of the people," Fox said. "I love hospice. People here, to me, it's just like a family. I'm going to cry. It's been that way ever since I started. We've all become so close. It's just nice."

Costa found that, too.

"Almost every time you come into work, one of the regular staff people always says, 'thank you for what you do.'"

With health and family issues sidelining two members of the fund development department, Costa is about to fill in and will likely be working full time for a few weeks.

Her hours will soon exceed her mother's, but it's not a competition.

Volunteering at hospice is just something that brings mother and daughter joy.

Contact reporter Lori Gilbert at (209) 546-8284 or lgilbert@recordnet.com. Follow her on Twitter @lorigrecord.

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