Jefferson City native Abby Farrow builds a life rooted in creativity, community, and authenticity.
Sometimes, Abby Farrow feels like a Sims video game character that has finally built out its personality. Throughout her 20s, the Jefferson City native has slowly curated a life that feels entirely her own.
Abby is woven into Jefferson City life in a way that feels ordinary and, simultaneously, beautiful and uncommon. She grew up in the capital city, attended Helias Catholic High School, and spent much of her adult life working with neighbors at Special Learning Center, High Rise Bakery, and Carrie’s Hallmark before becoming Deputy Director of the Missouri Community Service Commission (ServMo).
“I am a person who wants to be creative and connected to people,” she says. “I’ve thought about how making and serving coffee is a creative act. Latte art literally has the word art in it. Coffee shops bring what I think art and creativity bring to people: a sense of peace.”
She has what she jokingly calls a “big girl job” now, but she keeps coming back to the service industry. Most recently, Abby began working one shift a week as a barista at Matriarcha Coffee and Kitchen.
“I like bringing joy to people with the skills that I have,” she says.
For Abby, a flower shape poured into a latte or a carefully decorated cake is a small, everyday form of public art – intimate, fleeting, and handed to you from across a counter.
“Every coffee shop you work at, it is the same,” Abby explains. “You pull an espresso, you steam the milk, you make a latte. I love the repetition, the routine, the comfort of knowing that I do something well, and it's something that people want.”
Coffee, she adds, is “a luxury.” People make the choice to come to the coffee shop and spend some of their morning there. That choice makes the interaction feel meaningful. If she can make her customers feel seen for even five minutes, it’s a good day.
That desire to serve others took her away from home.
In her mid-twenties, Abby joined AmeriCorps NCCC, a national service program that placed her on a team traveling the country for disaster recovery projects.
Her team spent time in Houma Parish, Louisiana, helping rebuild homes damaged by hurricanes.
“We would put in flooring,” she recalls. “We would paint houses. I installed a couple of AC units. We put straps up in ceilings to reinforce them for hurricanes.”
As assistant team leader, Farrow lived and worked closely with young adults from across the country.
That experience ultimately led her to ServMo, where she now helps administer AmeriCorps funding across Missouri. These programs support everything from tutoring students in districts facing teacher shortages to mentoring young people who need additional support to stay engaged in school.
Abby is quick to acknowledge the fact that Jefferson City shaped her.
“This was a very safe place to grow up,” she says, crediting her supportive parents and the many opportunities she was afforded to explore extracurricular activities. “But sometimes, for people who are different, it's harder. There's a mold.”
And yet, she insists, “Jefferson City builds great people.”
“I'm going on a 30th birthday trip to Europe with friends I made in high school,” she says. “They'll be my friends forever because Jefferson City built great people.”
As an adult, her perspective has shifted from believing there was “nothing to do” in Jefferson City to realizing that opportunities are everywhere if you're willing to look. To cement her point, she rattles off recent adventures: bingo in Wardsville, movies on the Capitol lawn, Renegades baseball games, trivia at Cork & Board, and a beginner pottery class at Capital Arts.
“If you want to do things, you need only search,” she says. “The city is slowly growing and changing.”
Underneath the job titles and community involvement, Farrow says she's still learning how to fully become herself.
“I think I'm still learning how to feel and accept my emotions,” she says. “In order to feel happiness to the fullest, you have to feel all the other feelings. I have to appreciate my lows in order to feel my highs.”
That growth has meant embracing experiences that once felt intimidating – playing Dungeons & Dragons with her siblings, considering an improv class, and allowing herself to be more vulnerable with the people around her.
Sometimes, it even starts with something as simple as getting dressed.
“I'm finding clothes that are a little bit quirky,” she says. “The more you wear those things, the more people come up to you and say, 'I love your outfit.' They feel safe to come up to you, and it makes you feel even more empowered.”
In a “small, big town,” where it can feel like there isn’t much room to reinvent yourself, Abby Farrow is doing it anyway.
“Sometimes you just have to wear that funky scarf,” she says with a laugh.