South Bay Echo for Jan 28

In remembrance of Gary Lehto

Hello friends… Welcome to the 21th edition of South Bay Echo, your source of local hometown news with a real estate angle.

This Substack is brought to you by Rosetree Real Estate, a full service real estate brokerage dealing in residential and commercial properties to both own and lease. For more information visit RosetreeRealEstate.com. DRE# 02145024

I was not able to put a post together this week with my musings about recent events or planned real estate projects. Some of my opinions are not all that popular it seems anyways.

This week, I am mourning the loss of a friend who died over the weekend. Rather than my usual rundown, I would like to devote this week’s Substack to telling you about my good friend Gary Lehto.

Remembering Gary Lehto

Gary Lehto was the center of our King Harbor family. It’s hard to imagine life without him. He was always there for you with a helping hand or to look for the best deal on some special gadget you needed.

He was generous beyond belief. When he found a cool knife he bought a dozen of them and gave them away as gifts for no reason in particular. He once put together survival kits and handed them out to those of us on the dock. He was the leader of our D Dock crew. He even designed our own flag to fly on our sailboats.

Gary was curious about the world and adventurous. When he was younger, even after the accident, he travelled the world going to Asia several times and once sailed his boat from Redondo Beach all the way to Baja.

Gary went to Burning Man so much he bought a golf cart and a giant canopy tent and a storage unit out there to keep it all in during the off season. The guy really was remarkable. His older friends can recall even more adventurous times in his younger days.

There was nothing that slowed Gary down, even romance, having once shared a brief affair with a noteworthy film actress… (true story).

As a teenager, Gary hiked the entire Pacific Crest Trail as if God was telling him to go out there and use those legs son because they won’t last long. Gary lost the use of his legs in his early 20s after getting T-boned by a drunk driver on the way to surf in Malibu. A few days earlier, he narrowly escaped death as a smoke jumper in an incident that resulted in the deaths of several of his crew mates. Following the collision, Gary’s mother became one of the cofounders of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, which continues to have an impact today.

At 62, Gary lived longer than most paraplegics because he had such a strong desire to live. He taught me so much and I learned so much from him, all those little life hacks you could say. Gary knew the right way to do just about everything. Among his vast areas of knowledge was nutrition as Gary was always up on the latest science.

Throughout my friendship with Gary over the past 10 years people have said to me that’s so nice how you treat him. I always thought that sounded funny. Gary was cool. He was my friend because he was fun to be around. He was easy going and could laugh at himself. I didn’t give a damn that he was in a wheelchair and Gary didn’t need anybody’s sympathy.

I don’t blame him for doing what he did over the weekend. Everyone has their limits and Gary was the toughest guy I ever knew. I hope he’s somewhere now unburdened by those useless legs, able to bound over mountains and across green fields to a boat that sails him into a setting sun. I will sure miss him.