Giolli is a 30-something Pacifica resident. She is a student at Skyline Community College, majoring in psychology and economics. She is also a model of compassion and an example of the sort of selflessness that is so rare these days that seeing it with your own eyes can stop you cold.
Giolli is a Review reader so she saw Mark Noack’s front-page story on the travails of Ed Gallagher (Review, May 6). Though Giolli didn’t know him, Gallagher was a familiar sight on the Coastside. He was a fisherman who had come to the end of the road. A loner, Gallagher had parked his aging minivan at a campsite at Francis State Beach and was waiting to die of cancer. It was a sad story.
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“There was just something about the story. And when I met Ed, there was just something about Ed,” she said by way of explanation.
Giolli eventually got Gallagher settled into a Pacifica hospice and visited him every day. Volunteers there say she made Gallagher’s last days worth living. He took his last breath on June 18.
Giolli says she is no saint. She acknowledges walking past homeless people all the time, barely giving a thought to the gritty realities of their lives. But, for her, there was something about Ed and his story.
“I would never leave a person sleeping in his car,” she said. “I can’t do that.”
The world can be a cruel, oppressive place. Most of us are able to look away when we see someone in need. But not all of us. Some are like Giolli, people who put their own safety and welfare aside in order to help a stranger live – or die – with dignity.
There is just something about this story. And there is something about Xenia Giolli.
-- Clay Lambert
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