Gardening in spite of challenges? Anyone can do it!
Friday, October 30th, 2009Filed under: Themes, Wheelchairman of the Board
Quoting dallasnews.com:
Visiting David Gary’s garden would make a special trip to East Texas worthwhile. Beyond beautiful, the garden is a living manual for anyone longing to cultivate beauty but hesitant to begin because of age or physical disability.
“Gardening in spite of challenges? Anyone can do it,” Gary says with confidence; he lives the experience himself. “You can garden even in a wheelchair. And age isn’t a reason to quit gardening, either.”Now almost 63, Gary was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy in 1975 at age 28, and he was told he’d be in a wheelchair before he turned 40. He managed to go almost 20 years past that prediction.
“I’m a hammerhead,” he says with a laugh. “I wanted to prove them wrong.” Although he gets around now in a motorized scooter he calls “my Harley,” normal strength in his calves and ankles allows him to continue driving himself from Tyler to the Dallas Arboretum, where he began volunteering in 2003, two years before moving from Dallas.
In fact, it was the Arboretum that first inspired Gary to garden.
David Gary’s gardening tips…after the jump!
