Why Teach?

Sometimes I just have to step back and remind myself how I got into this game.
As a kid, I liked school, I was good at it and so I figured I'd enjoy it just as much on the other side of the desk.

I like kids (in a good way, not a sick way) and kids like me.

I have a fairly high tolerance for noise, messiness, compromise and change.

I have leadership qualities but not necessarily STRONG leadership qualities (because then I'd either be an administrator or managing adults in a totally different job)

The vacations are good.

My school is a few short blocks from my home.

With really very few exceptions, I work with an overwhelmingly professional, talented and supportive group of people.

I have quite a bit of autonomy in my own classroom and I like that.

I don't need to worry too much about someone trying to steal my job.

I have a sense of humor. Kids are funny (usually a lot funnier than adults) and that can be very enjoyable.

I like the feeling when I see kids enjoying learning and doing things for themselves and knowing I had a hand in that process.

Things I have had to accept about this line work
The money will NEVER (in my lifetime) be good. If this is a problem one needs to develop (or marry) other sources of income or try for a job in a higher paying school or move to a less expensive place than NYC.
Very few school buildings in NYC are spacious, comfortable or well appointed. If this was very important to me I would find those schools and try to get a job there.
While the importance of teaching "you shape the future hog-wash" is always paid lip-service, I have never felt exactly respected, as a teacher, by society in general.
There will always be children in my classes whom I cannot reach, save, cure or make everything all right for. I have gotten over it. I know I'm just not that special. I can still work to create a positive productive environment for those "special cases" for at least part of every day or week.
Difficult parents are a real pain, more than difficult children. But I know rationally that very few parents create problems for me. Humor, avoiding defensiveness, avoiding resistance and just plain "avoiding" work well enough.
Every year there is at least one seemingly intolerable situation – but the great thing about school is that however bad it may seem, it ends in June.

I admit, I advised my own children NOT to become teachers.
One got an MBA and is a financial analyst the other is a corporate lawyer and while they make a significantly large amount of $ and perhaps (just perhaps) they are more highly valued by society they suffer all the other difficulties that I have "accepted" and they suffer them in spades. They have little of the autonomy, fun, (messiness and noise) that I have. They have far fewer days off. They can't walk to work and they deal with many truly insane and/or despicable people.

Sometimes you just have to step back and remind yourself.