Teacher, How Do I LOVE Thee?

In honor of the first day of school, a reprint of a favorite of mine...

School has started!

On behalf of every mother who has spent all Summer covering her children with sun screen, washed every single towels in the house practically every day and wept every night after observing what happens to the house when children are home all day, I just want to say to every teacher out there:

I love you.

No, seriously. I love you. It's not like. "Like" is for baby sitters and substitutes. This is all out get-the-heart-shaped-boxes-of-chocolates LOVE.

Why do I love thee? With apologies to Ms. Elizabeth Barrett Browning, let me count the ways:

I love you for teaching my children how to add when I can't get them to put two socks in the laundry basket. Which is why their socks won't match in a week. Just a heads up.

I love you for teaching my children how to write their names when I spend the last few months believing they didn't even know their names – unless I used all three of them. (You know: "Sierra Paloma Prosapio! Come over here and put this shirt in that laundry basket." "Mireya Brisa Prosapio! Is this your toy embedded in my foot?")

I love you for showing me that my children are capable of sitting AND eating at the same time. Would you take a photo for me? I'd just like to see what it looks like.

I love you for somehow keeping my children relatively clean without having to resort to a garden hose.

I love you for taking my children for HOURS so when they come home I have had time to miss them and cherish them. And get to yoga class.

I love you for helping them when they are confused, smiling at them when they do well, and fighting the desire to banish them when they begin to drive you crazy.

I love you for teaching my children that lines are part of life, so the next time we are at the movies my child won't cut in front of 30 other people yelling "me first!"

I love you for facing crazy parents (of which I will be one) because when our children come home upset and we immediately ask for a teacher conference to find out how to keep our child from crying—ever.

And most of all, I love you for choosing to teach children, even though we don't pay you enough – not nearly enough and when I am Queen, teachers will be paid their weight in gold. Weekly.

So, to Mrs. Jarica, Mrs. Buxkemper, and all the teachers out there, when Friday rolls around on this first hectic week of school, I want you to feel it.

Feel the love.