Another art bench to go on the road

Nancy Heins Glaser

Special to Village News

Save Our Forest's "Take A Seat" project along with the buying patrons' and artists' lives have changed significantly since the amazing art benches were auctioned off November 2019. We wanted to follow the benches during this transition.

Artist Leslie Sweetland's, of The Green Art House, created "Take A Seat in The Meadow" which is a vibrantly painted canvas attached as a full sling back which features iconic California poppies dotted across rolling hills of green. The bench indeed does honor to our veterans; Sweetland accomplished her goal beautifully.

The person whose yard has been graced by this powerful statement bench is Temecula RN hero LeAnn Gerst who volunteered to go to New York on the front lines of the COVID-19 crisis early by signing up to work with veterans – many of them old. She left to come home June 2 as the protests began.

As an ER nurse previously working at Temecula Valley Hospital, Gerst said she "was driven to volunteer " to help out having heard the urgent call for nurses on the radio. Her husband admitted he knew it was coming because he knows her heart. It was a matter of when, not if.

During the interim in New York, she received a gift of masks from Julie Compton, artist and co-president of Fallbrook Art Association and of The Gallery with wishes of thanks "heartfelt from the homefront."

When contacted recently Gerst said, "I'm not back to work yet. I've been super busy at home spending time with my family.... I appreciate the masks that the ladies made that were sent. Please tell them thanks. "

Gerst got a great "welcome home" hug from her Great Dane, Eddie, upon returning from the Manhattan Veterans Hospital ICU.

Everyone in the family is happy she's back, but she is leaving again –this time for her husband's new job assignment. The bench will grace another yard at her new home in the fall.