Carle Place resident Richard Fenster considers himself an ordinary working man, but he is determined to do something extraordinary.

The Home Depot employee, husband, and father of three, is gearing up for the most ambitious trek of his life - an 1,100-plus mile walk from Florida to Long Island - to raise funds for children desperately in need of heart surgery.

Fenster plans to complete the fundraiser walk, which will benefit the Rotary Gift of Life Program, from March 31 to May 10. Gift of Life, Inc. is a project of Rotary District 7250 which provides open-heart surgery to needy children throughout the world. Founded in 1975, it is a non-profit corporation administered by participating Rotarians of District 7250. Through the program, doctors at participating hospitals donate their time and services for the surgeries, while money raised by Rotary funds the medical supplies and ancillary costs.

"I want to do something to really feel I'm accomplishing something with my life. So, I decided that I'd do something for the most important people that I can do it for," Fenster said in an interview this week, announcing plans for the Gift of Life walk. "And I figure, for all families, the most important thing to them is their kids."

Fenster's life-saving crusade will begin at the Home Depot store in St. Augustine, Florida, on March 31, and finish at the Home Depot in Jericho, Long Island. He will travel along US Route 1, walking an average of 28 miles a day, and staying nights in low-cost motels. Fenster will pay for travel and lodging out-of-pocket. There is quite a challenge involved in making the trek, and Fenster noted that he expects to encounter road hazards and wildlife along the solitary route, as he has in past fund-raising walks. "There's a chance I could have something go wrong along the way," he said. "There's no guarantee I'm going to make it, because I'm alone the whole way."

Just before the finish on Long Island, he will stop at Ronald McDonald House in New Hyde Park. He will then walk down Jericho Turnpike through Mineola, and into Carle Place. He is expected to be accompanied by students from Carle Place Middle School, as he heads through Westbury Avenue and Cherry Lane to the school. Fenster is grateful to students from the school who designed a T-shirt commemorating the event. After the local stop, Fenster will continue on to finish his journey at Jericho Home Depot.

Fenster hopes to raise $20,000 through the walk, enough to finance surgery costs for four children, he said. This year's walk follows the 1,000 MileWalk for Life led by Actor Chad Everett for The Gift of Life, this past fall. That walk started in Waycross, Georgia on Sept. 19, 2000 and was completed Oct. 8, 2000. Many volunteers joined Everett in the walk, including Fenster. In the past, Fenster has also done long-distance treks to raise funds for the Leukemia Society and St. Mary's Family and Children Services in Syosset.

The fundraiser for leukemia patients, completed in the fall of 1999, was a combination walk/bicycle trek of about 1175 miles through the Southern US, much of it in hurricane conditions. It raised about $6,000. In the spring of 2000, Fenster completed the fundraiser for St. Mary's Family and Children Services. He walked 220 miles throughout New York, stopping at 22 different Home Depot stores, and raised approximately $8,000. At the beginning of both walks, he received a blessing at Our Lady of Hope Catholic Church in Carle Place, where he is a parishioner, as well as an escort from the Carle Place Fire Department.

Fenster is an alumnus of Carle Place Public Schools, graduating from Carle Place High School in 1979. He and his wife Maria have three sons, Richard, 15, Chris, 13 and Timmy, 3. His compassion for ill children, and their families, continues to be the driving force behind his ultra-long-distance, fund-raising crusades.

"Any parents who have kids who have anything wrong with them - any cancer or any kind of disease, any kind of handicap, they're devastated by what's happened to them," he said. "And they're always looking in every direction to see if they can get some kind of help. And, you know, it affects them for the rest of their life."

Now, as Fenster embarks on his upcoming journey, he is hoping for the confidence and support of the community.

"I'm figuring, if I do something to help kids, maybe some of the kids that I help - they'll feel like there are other people out there who care about them," he said. "Even if they don't know who they are. I'm just trying to do my all to make an impact on somebody's life."

Robert Donno, chairman of the Rotary's Gift of Life program, is certain Fenster's rare display of heart will have an impact - on the lives of some very sick children. "You rarely find somebody who digs down as deeply as he does, and devotes so much of his time to try to save the life of a child," Donno said during a recent interview just before last week's Westbury-Carle Place Rotary Club meeting. Since its founding in 1975, Gift of Life has helped numerous children with failing hearts from around the world. Donno noted that the program most recently has arranged heart surgery for three Palestinian children at Long Island Jewish Schneider Children's Hospital.

According to Donno, those who wish to sponsor Richard Fenster's walk may send donations directly to the The Gift of Life, Inc.: 505 Northern Blvd., Suite 102, Great Neck, New York 11021. For further information about the program, one may contact Donno at 504-0830. Those who wish to contact Fenster may reach him this week at 747-6727.