Although for most of our lives to date, we have spent countless hours with our teachers and professors, we usually keep a safe distance from teachers in terms of relationships; I’d call it a liminal relationship between one of the work type and revered friend type. This usually entails the respect you give each other with privacy, space, quality of work and the like. But, have you ever wondered what the life of a teacher is actually like? Sure, you may hear your teacher rambling about some issues, get to know how many people are in their family or what’s been on their plate, but now that I am experiencing college as a student and simultaneously experiencing a relationship with a teacher, I sometimes can't help thinking of the double standard in my head that egregiously highlights certain fixes teachers have. As I am 18 and dating a teacher, things I may have more so nonchalantly addressed in the past have become much more real, leading to a deeper appreciation for my mentors throughout my life.

In high school, you consistently heard teachers complaining about the school system; in elementary and middle school, you might have helped teachers mark tests; throughout the years, you heard teachers talking about the ungodly hours they wake at. This has never hit me as firsthand as it has done now.To get to school early, to start the day and gather oneself for the day, many teachers sleep early and wake early – he goes to sleep around nine if he can help it and wakes up at five in the morning. Meanwhile, I’m here sleeping at one in the morning on a weekday and getting up six hours and in addition to that, sleeping in on the weekends. There’s no such thing as going out on a weekday, and weekends are often reserved for more work and rest. Even with what seems to be adequate sleep, however, it never will be fulfilling for teachers, as the day always ends with exhaustion and imminent work to complete. I mean, they’re dealing with us.

And if you ever had a good lesson from a teacher, you need to thank them from head to toe because lesson planning seems like one of the worst (and by that, I mean super annoying) things to do, especially if you are just starting out fresh. Writing tests and making keys for homework assignments also seem like a pain in the butt – trust the teacher when they say they don’t assign homework for his or her own benefit because it’s as simple as that – grading is tedious work. I’ve also seen some feats during my time observing at how constant the volume of the brick of papers can be.

As a student, these things have made me more appreciative of everything they’ve done and all the bullshit they put up with in teaching hundreds of students a year. Perhaps these points seem much like common sense, but trust me, my magnitude of gratitude has increased exponentially as I have learned more of the real stresses teachers have – after all, they hold some responsibility for our education! So students, let’s cut your teachers some slack; it is hard.

Of course, there are still aspects of being a teacher I still wonder about like how teachers can mess with students. We tend to take things at face value, allowing ourselves to become prime bait for creating humorous tales. Also, in relation to teacher gossip, those talks can get savage (in good humor and fun, of course), and it makes me wonder what my past teachers have talked about in the teacher lounges. Whenever I’m out with him, I can’t help thinking this is also what my teachers could be doing on a normal basis. I mean, little do his students know that he is with someone relatively close to their age.

So thank you, teachers past, for dealing with all the junk and jam of teaching – I don’t understand how any of you do it, and it is something I aspire to understand. But first and foremost, thank you for putting up with us.

And for anyone who is still wondering: no, he isn’t my current teacher in any shape or form. Goodness gracious.