School Days

With school starting in the morning it reminds me of my first experience with school. Some of you may remember me telling of my family moving into town because Mom and Dad just didn't think it would be safe for me to walk to the bus stop from the family farm having to cross a footlog over the creek, they just knew that I would have to stop and play in the water both going and coming home from school. Or possibly one of my older sisters deciding they had had enough of my pestering would push me off the log (I was a horrible baby sister). I can imagine that the sister that is 5 years older than me would have been more than a little happy to see the end of me since I usurped her position as baby in the family (she hasn't forgiven me for that even after all these years).

So we moved to town, which consisted of one combination grocery store, gas station, and upstairs on the week ends a movie theater, the 2 room school house and a Baptist church. Our house sat directly behind the school house. The only other residential building was the home of the people that ran/owned the store, and they had a daughter just my age. Meeting a new friend to play with was just about the most wonderful thing that had happened to me since my best friend and cousin had moved to another town. Angela and I shared many adventures climbing trees and making mud pies and any number of creative things little girls can think of. Then Angela's family sold the store and moved to St. Louis before school started so I was once again without a playmate.

The school didn't have a kindergarten and it would be another year before I was old enough for the first grade. And when school started I didn't even have my sisters and brother to torment to occupy my time. I was very adept at pretending and I had an imaginary playmate named Edna, (where I got that name I have no idea, but I thought it the most elegant name in the world and that I had made it up, and when I learned that someone actually had that name Edna went away). I would also roam around the yard and climb fences and any number of messy non elegant ways to occupy my time. One day I wandered down to the school house, it was still early fall and the doors were open and I would stand next to the wall and peep around the door to listen to what was going on in there. Mrs. Henry the first through forth grade teacher noticed me. She crooked her finger at me telling me to 'come here' inviting me in and I shyly walked into the classroom. I immediately fell in worship of her she was so gentle and kind and would sit me by her desk and included me in the first grade lessons. I would go to school everyday with my sister and hated weekends when there wasn't school. When school was out the last day of school was the last time I ever saw Mrs. Henry. That was the last year for the 2 room school. The county consolidated all the little schools so Mom and Dad sold that house and bought a house in Lesterville where the big school was (big in terms of more than 2 class rooms).

That summer after we had moved to Lesterville, I received the first letter addressed to me it contained a birthday card, a stick of juicy fruit gum and a letter from Mrs. Henry telling me how much she missed me.