Waynesboro woman receives 'Kindness in Action' recognition, read to blind

WAYNESBORO, Miss. - This week's Kindness in Action recipient is a Waynesboro woman who takes time out of her day for the people of Wayne county.

After overcoming two different types of cancer twice in her life, Becky Rhinehart, is a woman of courage, strength, and hope.

“My father had seven brothers and sisters, four of them had cancer, including my father, I am the only one in my family in my generation who had cancer" said Rhinehart.

She added, "It is so prevalent in my family.” Almost 20 years ago she was diagnosed with colon cancer, and in 2012 breast cancer too.

It is in her volunteering she finds joy. After her first chemotherapy and retirement in 1999 as a teacher in the Gulf Coast, Rhinehart offered her service to the people of Waynesboro and started to record herself reading the newspaper for the legally blind.

“When I got cancer, and I was blessed to be rid of it so to speak, one of the things that it always tells you in these books is, do for others, it helps get your mind off what your problems are, what you got bothers you" she said.

"If you are helping someone else, that’s why I try to find something else for others to make others lives a whole lot better" Rhinehart added.

Once a week she volunteers with the Wayne county 'Friends of the Library'. “The one volunteer job that I love the most is reading the paper for the blind people" she said.

Reading for the others is nostalgic for her, it reminds her of younger days with her grandfather.

She said, “He was very lonesome, he didn’t have too many friends that would come to see him, but one of the things that we did, was to get him a radio from the Mississippi Broadcasting, and every day at 9 o'clock someone would read the Clarion-Ledger."

"Someone would read the articles from the front page and the obituaries, and my grandfather loved that" Rhinehart said.

She sends the recorded tape of herself to the library and she is glad it makes a difference in the community.

“I like it, I mean it gives me something to do, I don’t do it for the recognition, I just do it because I know it is helping people, I even help myself when I was ill, and so in turn, I help others" she said.

It was through her journey of battling cancer she found strength to give to others the last 10 years.