A change of heart

COEUR d'ALENE — Dave Eubanks jokes that his first request after waking up from a heart transplant could've given his wife, Sherrie, a heart attack.

"She asked if there was anything she could bring me and I said a book on gardening," he said. "She said, 'What did you say?'"

Sherrie was dumbfounded considering Dave had zero green thumb interest before his surgery.

"I thought he'd lost his mind or the medications must've been really affecting him," she said with a laugh. "But it stuck."

Dave believes he had the change of heart — both literally and figuratively — because his heart donor, a 23-year-old male from California, had an interest in gardening.

"I don't know how you can prove it medically or scientifically, but it's something that's widely talked about," the 70-year-old Coeur d'Alene School District board member and former teacher said. "All I know is that I am different. I came out of it with an obsession to grow things that I never had before.

"I let a neighbor grow hay on my land before and only rode an ATV on it."

Today, nearly 10 years after his transplant, the Eubanks’ 20-acre Funny Farm has Christmas trees, 12,000 square feet of raised garden beds and 250 fruit trees.

"When I look at all the beautiful trees, I like to say that they came from the heart," Dave said.

The property is named after Dave's 360-degree turn and the atmosphere of a family with 10 children, including four who are still at home.

"It's a fun, fun place," said Dave, adding that the four children at home are adopted and have Down syndrome. "We have a lot of belly laughs every day."

As soon as he could after his surgery, he was manually and "frantically" digging holes to transplant seedlings on his Cougar Gulch property at 5924 Clemetson Road, Dave said.

"I almost couldn't stop; it was just nuts," he said. "I remember being out there under lights until midnight. (Sherrie) and I had conversations that the neighbors were going to start to think there's something wrong with me."

Perceived looks aside, Dave — who taught Spanish and woodworking at Lakes Middle School for the final 15 years of his 43-year teaching career — said the heart of a 23-year-old has given him a lot of gumption. Dave said he's had limited contact with the family of the donor because the situation is still painful for both himself and that family.

"Four to five months after the transplant I felt like Superman and could flip a car over," he said. "I was warned that I would feel really strong, and that's when I started planting in a frenzy."

His favorite crop is Christmas trees because they grow fast and because of what they mean to people.

"Ten years ago I planted seedlings that were like feathers and wondered if they'd survive," Dave said. "Now many of them are 8 feet tall."

He said it's a joy watching families find their perfect tree.

"Kids like to run around like it's a maze and they almost disappear in the trees," he said.

Coeur d'Alene kindergartners through third-graders benefit from the tree sales because $5 of every tree he sells is donated to Jingle Books, an annual book drive he co-founded. Jingle Books gives those students the opportunity to take home and keep six new or gently used books in the battle against illiteracy.

Sherrie said the couple also cans about 500 quarts of produce each summer and fall.

"It's been wonderful, but it's also a lot of work," she said. "We're like old pioneers."

Dave said other heart transplant patients he's chatted with during hospital visits have also experienced new desires after the surgery that they didn't have before.

One woman told him that she now craves sauerkraut.

"She said she always hated it before," he said. "I told her, 'At least your compulsion is cheap.'"

Another woman, a Mennonite, told him that she had a newfound liking for the smell of cigarette smoke. She had never smoked before or been around people who had.

Dave said his life-changing turnaround was a reminder to stay loose for changes that unexpectedly come your way.

"Be prepared," he said. "You never know when new opportunities or compulsions will change your life. In my case, it was a transplant."