Richard had spent most of his life changing tires on tractor trailers. After a while all that heavy lifting took a toll on his body. “I have a bad disk in my back, and I just couldn’t do the job anymore,” he said. Over the next...
When Cindy came to Cookeville in 2003, she had reached an all-time low in her life. “I had lost my home, my family and my life as I had known it,” she said. “It was all because of my drug addiction.” Cindy had spent the last...
When Stephen started working at the Columbia Goodwill store in 2005, he was quiet and shy, but you’d never know it if you met him today. “Stephen never meets a stranger, and he never forgets a name,” said Becky Kelly, the manager at Goodwill’s Columbia store....
In 2007, Cindy lost her husband. A year later, she lost her job. “It was a very difficult time,” she said. Cindy had been out of work for a year and a half when she stopped by the Goodwill Career Solutions center in Jackson for help....
After serving three years in prison, Kenneth went to work for a local company. Thirteen months later, his past came back to haunt him. “The company knew I had a felony, but when new management came in, they ran a background check and let me...
Joel spent 52 years in the household moving and storage business, relocating people worldwide. He was in his seventies when he finally retired, but he soon realized retirement life wasn’t for him. “It lasted about two years, and then I just decided I wanted to...
A stay-at-home mom, Dorothy had been out of the workforce for over 30 years. “I wanted to stay home and take care of my two children,” she said. “Then, when my children were teenagers, my sister passed away, and her three year old son came...
Jose had big plans. He wanted to be a doctor, and he was hoping to get a soccer scholarship to Vanderbilt University. But on June 4, 2007, his life was forever changed. Jose was jogging in Mount Pleasant when a driver of an SUV pulled...
For nearly two decades, Shelley lived a secret life. “I was a meth addict for 19 years, and then the inevitable happened,” she said. In 2010, police arrested Shelley for the first time. The judge sentenced her to two years of supervised probation and ordered her...
Shenita is always in a good mood. "I like to make people laugh," she says. Shenita worked at Goodwill years ago when she was in school. Then she worked on many different projects through another local organization that helps adults who have disabilities find work. In...
