MOST PEOPLE slow down at 70. Cindy Woody is just getting started. By the time the Volunteer Network named her Volunteer of the Year, she had already logged nearly 100 volunteer hours, much of it spent helping with hurricane relief.
This year alone, she’s staffed the storm shelter several times, surveyed damage after severe weather, and sat in solidarity with people who had nothing left but hope. So far this year, her hours have already topped 120.
And yet, when you ask her about it, she quickly shifts the spotlight away from herself.
“I don’t do it for the recognition,” she said. “I do it because it’s the right thing to do. It’s who I am.”
She said it plainly, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world — that giving your time and your heart should be second nature. And for Woody, it is.
Her story stretches from small-town Iowa to the sidewalks of Lebanon, with years of service in between. She began volunteering when she was just 12 or 13, well before she fully understood the weight of what it meant to show up for someone else. But it didn’t take long to learn.
As a teenager, she worked the night shift on a crisis hotline under the name “Crystal” to protect her identity. Her very first call was from another young girl around her age, on the brink of ending her life. Woody answered every call that came through after that. And the girl continued calling her throughout the year.
Until one day, on graduation day, someone tapped her shoulder and leaned in.
“Thanks, Crystal,” the girl whispered. “I wouldn’t be here without you.”
That moment has stayed with Woody ever since. It became the compass guiding every act of service that followed because she knows that making a difference doesn’t always require something big. It just requires presence — listening, staying, and showing up.
Her life has brought its share of service, but it’s also brought heartbreak.
For years, she and her husband dreamed of retiring to Tennessee. But life had other plans. Family responsibilities mounted. Loved ones fell ill. They said goodbye to those they loved, one by one, until finally, it was time for them to move. He had been cancer-free for three years. They started packing.
Six weeks later, she lost him to melanoma.
“It felt like the rug had been ripped out from under everything we planned,” she said. “But I couldn’t stay in that place of pain. I had to keep going. I had to live for both of us.”
She moved to California for a while to be closer to family. But Tennessee, and the dream they never got to share, kept calling. In 2023, she answered it, this time alone. She arrived in Lebanon, a town she had only known in passing.
“Some people thought I was crazy starting over at this stage in my life,” she said with a laugh. “But I didn’t want to live wondering ‘what if?’ Life’s too short for that.”
Woody immediately plugged into the Wilson County Volunteer Network, a nonprofit organization that responds to disasters, helps the unhoused access resources, and mobilizes volunteers for essential work. From volunteering at the Hope Shop to organizing food distributions, giving haircuts, and delivering supplies, there’s always a way to help. And Woody always finds it.
She’s a regular at First Fridays at Life Church, greeting every person with kindness as she hands out essentials. When hurricanes hit the region last fall, she was one of the first to show up at the Lebanon Fire Department’s relief drive — standing shoulder to shoulder with a local trucking company day after day, loading and delivering supplies.
And still, she rarely talks about any of it. She’d rather uplift those around her.
“There are good people here,” she said. “People who want to help. They just don’t always know where to start. I always tell them, ‘You don’t have to do much. Just do what you can.’”
In her time in Wilson County, Woody has seen both the beauty and the brokenness — how glaring the gap is between those who have and those who don’t. But the people who come for help, she said, have left the deepest impression.
“They’re so grateful and kind. That’s what struck me most.”
It’s part of why she’s fallen in love with Lebanon. Beneath the surface, she’s found a community of compassionate people who care and just need someone to show them the way. And that’s precisely what she does.
If you ask her what keeps her going, she’ll tell you humbly, “Helping others… it pulls you out of yourself,” she reflected. “You stop dwelling on your own problems. You start to realize how blessed you really are. And more than anything, you start to feel connected to something bigger than you.”
At 70, she knows she can’t fix everything. But she also knows people don’t always need something grand. Sometimes, they just need a warm meal. A conversation. A helping hand. A reminder that they matter.
“It doesn’t have to be a life-saving difference,” she said. “Any difference is worth making.”
Cindy Woody doesn’t just talk about community. She lives it — in every simple, faithful act of kindness. She doesn’t do it for the applause or attention but because it’s who she is.
And for anyone still wondering if and how they can really make an impact, she offers this:
“Just give of yourself.” GN
