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It’s the pain and stress relief he brings his clients that keeps Guy Berrysmith motivated and content in his chosen career.

A certified massage therapist with an thriving downtown practice for the past two decades, Berrysmith said one his most fulfilling experiences as of late was performing hospice massage.

“I worked with one longtime client on the day before he died, and the day he died,” Berrysmith explained during an interview at his Richardson Street studio. “Everybody deserves to be comfortable,” whether they are a stressed-out 40-year-old or a frail invalid in the final days of life.

Hailing from Seattle, Washington, where his father worked as an educator/photographer-turned-minister and his mother as a registered nurse, Berrysmith grew up with five brothers and sisters, attending Garfield High School, Western Washington State University and Seattle Community College. 

In the late 70s, he followed one of his sisters to Los Angeles and then to the Bay Area for a relationship.

“I met a woman and I’ve been in this area every since,” said Berrysmith, who has a deeply calm bearing and peaceful countenance. When his former wife suggested he should “look into” massage therapy as a profession, a “light came on and I decided to check out the American Institute of Massage Therapy.”

There Berrysmith was taught personally by Nancy Burr, an unsighted woman who founded the respected Walnut Creek school.

“Two months after I went there to meet her and interview, I began classes,” Berrysmith said. “I got so fired up on it that when classes suspended for the Christmas holidays, I asked if I could do an internship,” and continue to offer discounted massages, similar to reduced fees for services at beauty colleges or dental schools.

Berrysmith said he was grateful when Burr offered him a position as a teacher’s aid that would afford him an intensive course load in reflexology and shiatsu in return for teaching a few sports and deep tissue massage classes each week.

To this day, Berrysmith said he keeps his eyes closed for the majority of massage sessions, having learned technique from Burr focusing more on touch than visual stimulus.

After Burr passed away, the school closed and while at health fair, Berrysmith met some colleagues who mentioned studio space available in downtown Martinez.

The office space, above Luigi’s Deli, proved a perfect situation for Berrysmith and he operated his practice from there for 15 years. 

“I rented it month by month and from the very start I had clients,” he said.

A few years into his practice, he also began to offer chair massages on a weekly basis at the Mt. Diablo YMCA, which over seven years garnered him many fans who became regular clients.

These days Berrysmith runs his practice out of a rented mother-in-law apartment and studio behind one his client’s houses, as well as making hospice house calls. 

When he’s not working the knots out of client’s shoulders or helping to heal sports injuries, Berrysmith serves as a track official for motorcycle and car racing.

“I work safety patrol at the four tracks around [Northern California]:  Infineon, which will forever be called Sears Point, Laguna Seca, Thunderhill and Buttonwillow, 135 miles north of L.A.,” he said. “I am a flagger. There are 9 to 14 stations on a track and at the apex of each is where problems and serious injuries occur. If something happens, there is no way that the race controllers can see it, so I report exactly what is going on by flying flags.”

Berrysmith explained that there are different colored flags for oil on the track, a downed rider, caution or debris. 

He joined the raceway world after visiting a booth at a motorcycle show, 17 years ago. This racing season, he said he anticipates working 12 to 15 races as a track official.

Asked where he saw himself in five years, Berrysmith replied he would like to explore teaching and marketing a special massage creme he has developed over the years.

“And I still hope to be doing what I’m doing. I tell people that if I won the lottery, I’d be back here on Monday morning,” Berrysmith laughed.