~and it had everything to do with lemon drops~

Miss Irene Thompson was my second grade teacher back when I was just a little 7-year old girl attending a small rural school in Burrton, Kansas.  I know that she was a great teacher and that I must have learned many things from her but to this day, now 57 years later, my fondest memory of her had nothing to do with academics.

It had everything to do with lemon drops.

Miss Thompson was what we referred to back then as an old maid school teacher.  Once we kids asked her, and I remember it pretty plainly because only two years prior we foolishly asked our kindergarten teacher the very same thing, a question that was pretty blunt and to the point.

"How come it is that you aren't married and don't have any kids Miss Thompson?"
And in a sweet voice, she replied back with the very same answer that Miss Josephine Marmont had told us as kindergarteners.  

"But I do have children.  All of you are my children."
So, ok then.  
We were her children.  
End of questions.

Miss Thompson's old wooden teacher desk was always kept at the front of the room, and to the best of my memory it never moved from that spot all year long.  I know it wasn't bolted into the floor but you would have thought so because it never changed locations.  In the bottom drawer on the left hand side, she always kept a cellophane bag full of lemon drops.  When kids got to coughing during cold and flu season, Miss Thompson would slowly pull the drawer open and reach inside to retrieve one for whatever kid was ailing.  Those sweet yellow candies coated with sugar, also came in handy when a kid did well on a spelling test or was missing their momma and wanted to go home.  Our teacher knew full well the enticing power of a piece of hard candy to the little kids we all were back then.

One of many things you could say about Miss Thompson was this.
She was very smart.

I've been a teacher for 4 decades now and had the chance to see hundreds of kids come in and out of my classroom.  For some reason today, I've been wondering something.  I wonder what it is that kids will have remembered about me in the years to come when they no longer are young.  When they sit back in the summer of their 63rd year, what will they remember most about a teacher named Mrs. Renfro?

I hope that they remember first of all the most important thing that I wanted them to know.
Their teacher loved them.

                              For all the teachers who loved a little girl like me, thank you!