Most of us are reluctant to ask for help because until we get some we don't realize how many people are standing by waiting for a chance to give it.

Garry Janz is learning that as he spends weeks waiting for broken bones to knit.

He got his first taste of the better side of human nature three years ago when he came up with the idea of Ride For Dad, an appeal to motorcycle owners and riders to get together to raise money for prostate cancer research. Then 55, he had fallen in love with motorcycles after years away from them.

The response to his idea was overwhelming, and for the past couple of years there has been a day in the spring when the roads between Ottawa and Calabogie are a moving line of leather and machines.

On June 20, he was on a ride with friend Gerry Westland through the mountains of Virginia when an accident opened an opportunity for him to once again study the better side of human nature.

"I have only a dim memory of something coming towards me. Then I woke up looking at a red sky. I was looking though blood."

It was a deer. The impact point was at his left elbow, and that arm was shattered. His $20,000 Yamaha fell over onto his right leg and by the time the skidding and bouncing stopped, the leg was broken in several places. The bike was a writeoff.

"I was lucky we were going through a state park. Rangers were on the scene quickly and they knew what to do and called for help."

The leg couldn't wait for repair and that surgery was done in a Virginia hospital. Then he was airlifted home and doctors at the General campus of the Ottawa Hospital went to work on the arm.

Garry and wife, Linda McGreevy, live in Carleton Place on a two-acre lot that tends to keep them separated from their neighbours, who have similar big yards. They didn't feel they knew their neighbours well, usually just waving or throwing a smile in passing. They now know they underestimated the power of a smile.

"I looked out the window one day and saw neighbours cutting my lawn. There were eight of them on ride 'em mowers."

Linda had a similar surprise. With Garry in hospital, she found her time limited and their big vegetable garden needed weeding. On her way back from a hospital visit, she decided she would start that job. She couldn't. When she got home she couldn't find a weed. Neighbours had been busy. There were meals delivered and many requests for an assignment that could help.

"We are surrounded by guardian angels," says Linda. "I think there was one sitting on Garry's shoulder that day (in Virginia)."

Garry agrees. "That was close," he says. "You come through something like that with a new perspective. Not just about how great people are, but about what's important in life, and how great it is."