Green life improves resident life at Foxdale Village
Before they moved into a cozy little apartment at Foxdale Village Retirement Community, Doris Trueblood and her husband, Cecil, lived in a handsome property on Park Hills Avenue.
The house was really just something to offset the garden, a sprawling palette of greens interspersed with eye-popping bursts of vibrant color — you might call them flowers.
Tall ones too, peppered in between bushes and trees of equally robust good health.
As you get older, you think about not so much work.
Doris Trueblood
It made for a nice photo in the real estate section of the CDT— one that Doris Trueblood thinks may have ultimately intimidated potential buyers wary of making such a serious, long-term commitment to Mother Nature.
“The people who bought it said, ‘Would you come over and tell us what the plants are?’ ” Trueblood said.
Her garden at Foxdale is a little more streamlined and could probably be navigated without the help of a guidebook or scythe.
There are a few tomato plants, some impatiens and an intimate gathering among members of the iris family.
“As you get older, you think about not so much work,” Trueblood said.
Still, it’s hard to escape plant life at Foxdale. It’s everywhere — at the entrances, outside of the bistro, even on the balconies of the second- or third-floor apartments.
There’s something just very uplifting about it. It does make a difference.
John Zavodni
Trueblood has noticed that even the folks who can no longer drive or are otherwise without transportation make it a point to nurture some kind of a garden around their cottages.
A few azaleas here or there can make the difference between “home” and “hotel.”
“You think of nursing homes and community centers and there’s just nothing there,” Trueblood said.
She’s part of a small, five-person committee that takes care of the green life on Foxdale’s campus and runs the plant sales held every April and May — the profits from which are the seeds that sprout the begonias, petunias and sweet potato vines scattered throughout the property.
The extra effort hasn’t gone unnoticed. Foxdale resident John Zavodni thinks that the landscaping flourishes make an impression, both on visitors and people who call the retirement community home.
“There’s something just very uplifting about it. It does make a difference,” Zavodni said.
Frank Ready: 814-231-4620, @fjready
This story was originally published September 7, 2017 at 12:46 PM with the headline "Green life improves resident life at Foxdale Village."