The Background of a Baker

Jenks is made up of a large swirling pool of teacher, students, and administrators making it hard to meet and know everyone. Many people became faces in the hall, background characters in our everyday lives. Each passing face has their own in-depth and complex life as the next, seemingly unknown until you take a closer look. Senior Abby Mansfield appears to blend in but finds enjoyment in her work outside of school. “I work at Esperoges. It’s a cute little croissant bakery at the corner of Elban Main in Jenks and it’s owned by an awesome woman named Hope,” Mansfield explained. “Esperoges means hope in French so [the owner] kinda named it after herself which is so cute. She’s been open for a little over a year now and I’ve worked with her since two months after she had opened.”   She reminisces about her early experiences within a kitchen. “My mom started baking with me when I was really young,” Mansfield said. “We always made brownies together I would stand on my little step stool by the counter and she would stand behind me and help me measure stuff. It’s something she likes to do and I always like to do it with her.”While baking is not something she wants to do for the rest of her life, she explained, “it’s fun right now. I’m planning on going into speech pathology, which is just like speech therapy.”When asked if her goal was to help people, she responded, “Yeah, I do. I studied Chinese for I think seven years and when you do a Speech Therapy Test you have to do it in your native language, so I want to use Chinese to help some Chinese families either here in Tulsa or maybe, eventually, go over to China.” We all can get carried away with our own lives and seem to miss out on the other lives around us. Take time to know the background characters and recognize them for who they are, and they will know you too. We are all faces in a hallway with all of our own stories.By Sarah Stanley