... make the most of what's available.
Annie Gardner
When the love of Annie Gardner's life moved to Iowa City, she was not far behind.
"I was in love with my grandson," Gardner said. "When they moved up here, I just had a fit."
Gardner, 55, followed her first grandson and his mother when they left Chicago four years ago for Iowa City. Gardner knew she could thrive in a new environment.
Her most valued advice is to make the most of what is available.
"There are so many things that are offered to you," Gardner said. "If you take them and work with them, you'll be pretty good."
Gardner, who seems to know or meet someone everywhere she goes, found a network of local support in the Neighborhood Centers of Johnson County.
"I got to know a lot of nice people," she said.
She met the kind of people who help out in a crisis, such as the morning Gardner woke up in pain so great she could not walk.
The pain she felt was rheumatoid arthritis, chronic arthritis that occurs in joints on both sides of the body. People from the centers ran errands for her and took her to appointments during her worst times of sickness.
Gardner can no longer work in daycare like she used to. Yet she refuses to let her ailments defeat her. Gardner worked with a job coach to find a job safe for her condition.
"If I can work, I'm going to work," said Gardner, a cafeteria attendant for a year now at Goodwill Industries of Southeast Iowa.
Each morning, she prepares the cafeteria, which she refers to as "my kitchen," for employees and helps those with disabilities prepare their food.
Gardner continues to devote a large part of her life to children. Known to many as "Miss Annie," "Granny Annie" and "Old Lady," she has volunteered at Halloween parties, filled children's back-to-school bookbags, and prepared food for cookouts at the neighborhood centers.
Each time Gardner visits the centers, she meets new people. "In most ways, that's good, because you get all kinds of information," she said.
"It's the listening to people - not thinking that you know so much that you can't listen or learn something every day," she said.
— Megan Carney
