Brian “Pablo” Good first noticed a problem last winter when he went down to visit his daughter, Lacee, in Arizona. There was a teen roping competition, but Pablo had no interest in going.  

“I was born and raised on a horse,” Pablo said. “And all of a sudden I had no energy, no desire for rodeo.”

His wife, Danae Good, noticed the change, too. Pablo is a man who doesn’t shy away from hard work. He runs a couple ranches near his home outside Greybull, farms, and operates a bentonite business and a trucking company.

He was always up at 5 a.m. and didn’t come home until late. Now, he slept later and moved slower. 

When he developed a bump in his neck, it was clear something was very wrong. In March he went to see a doctor in Lovell, and the doctor told him to go see a specialist in Cody. The diagnosis was troubling. 

“I never thought anything in life ever bothered me,” Pablo said. “But you really have a different outlook on life when you hear those three words: ‘You’ve got cancer.’”

The Goods had no insurance and his illness was making it very difficult for Pablo to work. His income was already suffering from the COVID pandemic, which decimated his bentonite business, and they had just bought a modular home. With the cancer draining Pablo’s energy, the house still is unfinished. 

When Pablo’s friend, Brett Crosby, learned of his condition, he set up a GoFundMe site to help. The Goods are known in the community, and the fundraiser hit its initial $5,000 goal quickly. Pablo wasn’t aware of the effort and when Danae told him about it, Pablo refused to accept any money. As someone who pours his generosity on others, Pablo found it hard to accept help when he was the one in need. 

“He likes to be the one doing the giving,” Danae explained. 

But as his circumstances weighed on him, Danae was finally able to convince Pablo that he’s earned the help people are offering. Many who know him would agree. 

Like a son 

Crosby first met Pablo in a snowy October about 10 years ago. A trucker Crosby had hired to haul cattle quit while blizzards blanketed Wyoming and South Dakota. Crosby had 300 head to haul and no one to haul them. He called up Good, who dropped everything to come to help. 

“That was the beginning of my friendship with him,” Crosby said. Today he considers Pablo one of his closest friends.

Crosby said one of the first times he noticed the Goods’ charitable qualities was in their relationship with a disabled Greybull resident, Earl Watkins. 

The Goods met Watkins in the 1990s. He was born in 1976 and grew up in Manderson. Before the Goods came into his life, Watkins’ life was a lonely one. 

Crosby said he would see Watkins at community dances, and Watkins always wanted to be part of the crowd. Besides being a bit shy, he has a speech impediment that made it hard for him to communicate. 

“No one really accepted him,” Crosby recalled.

Watkins said he developed the impediment when his parents poured hot soup down his throat to stop him from crying. He said they also used to throw him against a brick wall. 

“They tortured him pretty good,” Pablo said.

Watkins spent much of his early life not having enough to eat and he left home at 17. Though he graduated high school, he could barely read or write. Watkins said his parents didn’t provide much for him, and his disabilities made it hard for him to find work as an adult. 

The Goods helped Watkins get into low income housing, in the same complex where Pablo’s mother, Myrna, lives. Watkins helps look after Myrna and the Goods make sure Watkins has all he needs.

By nature, he’s gentle and loves taking care of animals. With his youthful giggle and bashful smile, it’s hard to imagine anyone would do him any harm.

He helps take care of the Goods’ livestock, and Pablo said Watkins would never let the animals go hungry. Watkins takes so much care to ensure the animals are fed that he’ll give the horses two bales of hay when Pablo says to give only one.

Watkins also took to raising chickens. Danae bought a couple dozen chicks, expecting half to die as is usually the case when raising chickens. Instead, they all survived and so they had a lot of chickens. 

“I took care of them,” Watkins said. 

Watkins got a bit entrepreneurial with the eggs. For a while, the family had more eggs than they knew what to do with. Then, all of a sudden, the eggs stopped coming. Pablo asked Watkins what happened, and Watkins would shrug and say he didn’t know why the chickens stopped producing. 

A short while later, Pablo was having a drink with Watkins at a local pub, and overheard the staff asking Watkins if he had any more eggs. It turns out, Watkins was trading the eggs for beer. 

As Pablo tells the story, Watkins giggles and blushes. 

“He can’t say he’s not loved now. He’s got a lot of people that love him, don’t you, Earl?” Danae said, as Watkins nodded his head and grinned.  

The Goods not only gave Watkins a family to care for him, they’ve helped him find his own self-respect. After he had a place to live and food to eat, his parents called to ask for money. Watkins refused. 

“I said, ‘I want some.’ You give me some money now,” Watkins said. 

It’s not just Watkins who’s benefited from the Goods’ generosity. Paul Richardson, who works on the Goods’ ranch, had a mountain of health problems, even spending time in the ICU with the doctors saying he had little chance to get out. 

As Richardson and Watkins work on a hot walker, he talks about how Pablo helped him through all those challenges. 

“They’ve done more for me than anyone ever has,” Richardson said. 

Crosby said he uses the Goods’ story to teach his own children about the value of community. 

“They’ve always been an example to me of how members of a community should take care of each other,” Crosby said. “They say it takes a village to raise a child, but really it takes individuals who take care of individuals.” 

The good fight

The doctors aren’t sure what stage Pablo’s cancer is in, but they’re treating it as stage four. 

“It’s really aggressive and fast,” he said. 

Pablo is a man who’s been bucked off and trampled by horses. A colt fell over backwards with him back in 2016. He survived all that and is gearing up to give cancer a fight.

This week, he’ll begin treatment. It will require him to make three-hour round trips to Cody five days per week. On one of those days, he’ll go through several hours of chemo, which will leave him so sick he’ll have trouble making the drive back. Fortunately, he’ll have Watkins to help him make the trip. 

“He’s a good egg,” Pablo said, and Danae adds, “I honestly don’t know what we’d do without Earl.” 

The doctors told Pablo he has a good chance to beat his cancer, but Pablo is still putting some things in order to make sure his family is cared for, just in case. 

This includes investing in precious metals for his 15-month-old granddaughter, Taylynn. Pablo’s eyes light up and he smiles brightly when he talks about the little girl falling asleep in the bed next to him. 

“It just made me feel good,” he said. 

Pablo also tries to keep up with the work as much as possible. Though he can’t do as much as he used to, he said it helps him cope.  

“I like to farm. I like to ranch,” Pablo said. “And I like to irrigate. There’s nothing more soothing than sitting at the edge of the field and listening to that water run.”

The Goods were able to get insurance through the Affordable Care Act, which will cover pre-existing conditions, though they still aren’t sure what will and won’t be covered. It’s been expensive so far, and Pablo has several months to go before he’ll be able to work again. Nothing will cover his lost wages, which he estimates could go as high as $100,000 by the time he’s done. 

Until then, Pablo has had to get comfortable with being on the receiving end of all that he and his wife have paid forward. He speaks highly of all the people who have so readily stepped up to get him through it all. 

“Two things are good in life: family and friends. And I’ll get through it,” Pablo said. 

To donate to Pablo’s fundraiser, visit gofund.me/ae24e102. Donations can also be made to a benefit account, under the name Brian Good, at the Bank of Lovell.