McMeans knows consequences of drinking and driving
Posted September 6, 2012
Blake McMeans knows first hand the consequences of drinking and driving. Now he's devoted his life to helping others avoid making the mistakes he made. McMeans will open the 2012-13 Follin Speaker Series with a presentation on Sept. 25 at 2:15 p.m. in the The Webb School chapel.
McMeans was a tennis player ranked No. 4 in the nation when he suffered life-threatening injuries in a car accident, the result of drinking and driving. McMeans' biography notes that his life changed forever. He is primarily confined to a wheel chair, and his dreams of becoming a professional athlete are gone forever. In fact, he will never play tennis again.
Today, McMeans speaks in high schools and middle schools, on college campuses and at community events across the country using his own life story to convince students not to drink and drive or ride with someone who has been drinking.
"It would be very difficult for any person who hasn't experienced what I've experienced since that tragic mistake to understand the adversity, the hardship, the enormous struggle, that I, and my family, have had to go through," McMeans explains on his website. "By speaking in public, I hope to bring home to people the reality of what drinking and driving can do to a person's life. I'm someone about whom the cliché 'he had it all' is true. I did have it all, and I'm fortunate to have a loving family who has stood by me and helped me through this adversity. Now my wish is that I can reach out to people, young and old, and keep many others from ever having to experience the consequences of drinking and driving."
The speaker series is an endowed program at The Webb School, an independent college preparatory boarding/day school for grades 6-12. For more information about The Webb School visit: www.thewebbschool.com.
