RED, RIPE TOMATOES AND A LIFE LESSON, Boston Globe, September 14, 2009
Retired teacher Greg Wadleigh holds today's Boston Globe Op-Ed page, where he was the subject of an essay.
GREG WADLEIGH’S tomato crop is ripe for picking. Red balls, plump with pulp, hang from arching vines.
I’ve been waiting weeks for the harvest so I can get a closer view of Wadleigh commanding nature from the seat of his disability scooter. Wadleigh has multiple sclerosis and can’t crawl around in the dirt any longer. But the retired music teacher has figured out another way to grow things. He fills 5-gallon pails with soil in his front yard and zips from container to container, planting seeds and tending the plants. A composting drum sits in one corner of the yard, and a shed separates the flower garden from the vegetables.
