He grew up going to the waterfall at Jamison Creek, taking turns with friends plunging into the icy water coming off the mountain and into a pool near a small town north of Truckee.

So when Matt Gonsalves brought his Chico State friends home to Portola in 1991, he wanted to show his then-girlfriend and another couple a good time in one of his favorite places.

So he dove. He didn't hit any rocks, but he did hit the bottom of the pool 15 feet down after breaking his neck when he hit the water.

Gonsalves, now 43, has spent the past 20 years of his life as a quadriplegic. Today, instead of bemoaning the anniversary of that day, his friends and family are gathering at Central Park in Davis to celebrate the two decades of success he has made for himself.

"I am nervous about it," Gonsalves said. He sits in his motorized wheelchair and uses the muscles in his left arm to maneuver the joystick that allows him to get around his Natomas home. "I just want everyone to have a good time."

After the accident, Gonsalves was unconscious for three days, and the doctors told his mother, Teresa Gula, that it was time to think about taking him off life support.

Gula went to him, looked into his face and spoke to him slowly and deliberately. He opened his eyes for the first time since the accident. Not only did his mother see his familiar blue eyes, but she saw recognition and slight annoyance at her tone of voice. She told the doctors he was going to make it.

"The prognosis was so dire that every little thing on the plus side was something to rejoice," Gula said. "It wasn't time to grieve. We just kept counting these small things that he was overcoming."

After months of rehab, learning to breathe and communicate again, Gonsalves moved in with his girlfriend Luanna Putney, who was getting a Ph.D. at UC Davis. Shortly thereafter, Gonsalves enrolled at UC Davis to earn a bachelor's degree in public policy.

"It was really tough," he said. "It was a program that required 20-page papers, and I was typing one letter a second. So I was at a one-finger typing pace and took two classes at a time."

Gonsalves and Putney married two years after his accident, and Gonsalves got a job with Contra Costa County as a contractor. He used public transportation – two hours each way – to get to his job.

In time, the couple had two daughters, Tessa, now 8, and Jacy, 7. Although Gonsalves and his wife are no longer married, they are raising their daughters together.

At first, Gonsalves home-schooled his girls while his wife was at work. These days, Tessa and Jacy attend a school for gifted students. After school, they go home to be with their father, who helps them with their homework and supports their extracurricular activities until their mother, who lives minutes away, gets off work.

"It's great being a parent; they treat me like every other dad," Gonsalves said.

When asked about what motivates him every day, he pointed to his daughters and said, "You're lookin' at 'em."

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