GUILDERLAND — Diane Cameron, the new director for Community Caregivers, is an optimist.

She speaks with passion and writes with spare elegance. Cameron submitted a column to the Enterprise for this week, published on the opinion pages, so the community could get to know her.

In it, she candidly discusses coming to terms with the deaths of those close to her.
"So the wise men’s lesson," she writes of the Christmas story, "is all about faith: We do our best, we study, we consult with others, we try to be wise men and women, but we have to get on our camels, bring our gifts, and hope we are doing good."
Cameron knows from her own life’s experiences about much of what the Community Caregivers offer. "Some of the services are respite for the end of life," she said. "I’ve done this. I know it’s exhausting. My siblings have all died. I was the primary caregiver...I know what it’s like to just wish you could go to the store or take a shower."

The youngest of five children, Cameron is the only one surviving; her siblings all died in their forties, she said.

She is able to use that experience, though, in a way that is useful and extends help to other. She is also able to revel in and celebrate life.

She is a first-time grandmother. Her daughter, Shannon, gave birth a month ago to her first grandchild, Josephine.
"It’s like falling in love all over again," she said of being a grandmother. "I want the world to be so much better for her...I want world peace."
That experience, too, has shaped Cameron’s ideas on what she can do in her new job. While her daughter, who lives in Toronto, is near caring family and friends, Cameron said, "People think seniors, seniors, seniors," when they think of those in need. But, she went on, "I’ve become aware of all the little ways a young family needs help....
"Sometimes you just need to be able to call someone when maybe it sounds like the baby’s breathing isn’t right. You don’t need a doctor. You need someone who can say, ‘Don’t be scared; they breathe like that sometimes.’"

"A giving-back point"

Cameron has spent a lifetime working in not-for-profit organizations yet she says, at age 53, she feels a need to give back.

Community Caregivers harnesses the energy and skills of volunteers to provide free services for Albany County residents in need. For example, a volunteer may drive an elderly person to a medical appointment or help an ailing young mother with child care.

The agency was originally based in Altamont, is now located off of Route 155 in Guilderland, and will soon move back to Altamont to occupy a former church on Gun Club Road, donated by developer Jeff Thomas.
"A lot of retired people are involved or on the board," said Cameron of the Community Caregivers. "There’s a giving-back point, and I think I’ve crossed into it."

The Community Caregivers has had a series of short-term directors, but Cameron says she plans a long tenure.

Joseph Purcell, president of the Caregivers’ board of trustees, himself a retired educator, said the board is excited about having Cameron as executive director. She was one of 25 applicants for the post, which was vacated by Judith McKinnon after two years.
Cameron will be paid an annual salary of $60,000, which Purcell termed "a bargain" considering her background and experience.
"She has a lot of experience as an executive director and a lot of experience in fund-raising and has been successful at both," said Purcell.
A committee that he said was made up of "a cross-section of people in our organization," including volunteers, office workers, and board members, selected two candidates and then the executive committee interviewed those two and selected Cameron.
"Everyone she worked for talked about her enthusiasm and energy," said Purcell. "She really likes working for a smaller organization. She related really well to our mission...She likes what we do; that’s very important."

Purcell thinks Cameron will have a smooth transition when she starts work on Jan. 9 because of the capable work done by the interim director, Greg Goutos, who was not a candidate for the permanent post.
"In the few weeks he’s been here, he’s done great organizational things," said Purcell of Goutos. "So we’ll be in good shape when Diane arrives. We’re excited about having her come. She’ll put a real spark in the organization."

Helping neighbors

As Cameron talks about her life, it seems as if the disparate threads have come together to form the whole cloth of her new job.

Cameron grew up in Pittsburgh, Pa. in a service-minded family.
"My parents were very involved in the community," she said. "As I kid, I was dragged around when they volunteered."

Her parents were active in the Methodist church food pantry, shelter, and clothes closet — serving the inner city.
Her father was an engineer and her mother eventually became a weaver, giving "sheep to shawl" demonstrations, teaching about the making of cloth from the shearing on.
"One of the things I saw my parents do was raise money," said Cameron. "I could write from when I was very little." At the tender age of 12, Cameron was already helping to compose letters to raise funds for worthy causes.
She learned to write from reading, she said, and has kept a diary since she was six years old. "I must have read about it in Little Women," she said of Louisa May Alcott’s classic.

Always an organized person, Cameron also made to-do lists at a very young age, she said.

She left home for George Mason University, outside of Washington, D.C., where she studied both fine arts and business.
"Those are the two things I cared about and got excited about," she said about her diverse fields of interest.

She volunteered with her college’s theater group and would help apply for grants when needed.
After college, she said, "I got married, I got divorced, life happened."
Her first "real job," Cameron said, was in development in regional theater in Baltimore.
"Development has so much writing in it, that muscle got stronger," she said.

Cameron went on to work for a number of different kinds of non-profit organizations, including a school for emotionally disturbed children and a public school for the arts.
Then, she said, "I fell in love with someone from upstate New York. We were both on vacation in Rhinebeck, the furthest north I’d ever been."

She made the move to be with him; now the couple lives in Valatie. When they leave the house in the morning, they will travel in different directions. Her husband heads south to Hudson, where he teaches psychology at Columbia-Greene Community College.

She will drive 40 minutes on Interstate 90, north to Guilderland to her new job at Community Caregivers.
"I’m blown away by the people at Community Caregivers," said Cameron. "Something seemingly as old-fashioned as neighbors helping neighbors works well and is needed...It’s very inspiring."
Asked about her plans for leading the organization, Cameron said, "My immediate goal is to go with the volunteers, see the program, see what kinds of volunteers we need."
She also wants to work on recruitment, to see "what we can do to get more people comfortable with volunteering."
Cameron said she plans to stay with the program. "My hope is I’ll be here a long time...10 years," she said when pressed for an estimate.
"I’d like to see it bigger, bigger — more regional," she said of long-term aims.
She concluded of the Caregivers’ mission, "In this age when people don’t know their neighbors, they still have it in them...Some part of us still wants to help a neighbor and clearly our neighbors need some help."