Mint- A Simple Pleasure

In the Spotlight - Tanner Mayfield 

By Judy Pimperl

Tanner Mayfield gets up early to pick purple hull peas before going to work at Oakwood Center for Living.  Loading the morning’s harvest into recycled Wal-mart bags, he heads to work where he spends his days working with the maintenance team to keep the air conditioners working and so many other things.  It’s all about the comfort and care of the residents there, but Tanner goes above and beyond what his job requires.  When the pandemic struck and took a toll on so many of our elderly friends, protocols changed in our nursing facilities in an effort to protect our most vulnerable.  Where they once had social events, arts and crafts and simple visits from family members, they now were isolated to keep them safe, but for so many, especially those suffering from dementia, this new reality made their situation dire.  It helps the residents to have activities to keep their minds as healthy as possible, and to provide memories from years past.  Tanner realized that the simple act of shelling peas brought back pleasant memories for some of his resident friends, so he picked peas.

I have had the pleasure of watching Tanner grow the garden from the beginning, You see, he lives on my home property in our cabin, and one day he approached my husband and asked if we would let him grow a garden here.  My husband is a retired farm boy who loves fresh vegetables too, so after a quick “yes,” they were plowing the soil.  Tanner called it a “sharecroppers” garden, since several had a hand in making it happen, but Tanner was the one who showed the garden the most love.

I recently spoke to Haleigh Cale, the Activities Director at Oakwood, and she had this to say about Tanner:  “We are very thankful for all of our coworkers here at Oakwood Center of Living and all of their hard work, however we (the residents can agree) are very thankful for Tanner Mayfield.  Tanner is part of our maintenance team here at Oakwood.  He always goes the extra mile to put a smile on our residents’ faces by participating in activities and dressing up for our holiday parties.  Here lately with the Covid-19 cases on the rise we have had to put a halt on group activities and Tanner still finds a way to keep our residents happy.  He has recently started picking vegetables from his personal garden and bringing them to the residents to enjoy.  The activity and dietary teams were able to put together a small group and fry some of the okra that Tanner gifted for the residents to enjoy while they played dominos/card games.  Our residents felt even more at home with home grown vegetables to enjoy.  All employees/residents would like to say a special thank you to Tanner for always thinking of our Oakwood family, especially during this difficult time in the COVID pandemic.”

As I write this, the garden has stopped producing, but as we celebrate Thanksgiving in a few weeks, I will have bundles of dried okra and corn stalks to use as decorations for the tables, so our centerpieces will bring yet more beautiful reminders of Tanner’s garden and kindness as we enjoy our holiday meal.  After the meal, we will take the centerpieces apart and save the seeds for next year, and unless Tanner moves away to a new place, I’m pretty sure there will be another garden next spring.  And if he makes the garden, I’m absolutely sure he will remember all of his friends and family members with fresh vegetables once again, because that’s just how Tanner is.