Why We Love Our Teachers

Many years ago, as a tenth grader at Malverne High School, in New York, I made the mistake of asking my English teacher, Charles Messinger, why he was forcing us to memorize Shelley’s “Ozymandias.” We were already memorizing, and reciting, much of Hamlet, and I was in the middle of preparing my lines for the spring musical he directed. The Bronx-born Messinger made short work of my complaint. “It’s better to be literate than illiterate,” he said. “You’ll thank me later.”

Mr. Messinger died three years ago, and I never did properly thank him, even though he changed my life. Soon after he died, I called my social-studies teacher, Douglas Sheer, the other teacher who changed my life. Mr. Sheer is much younger than Mr. Messinger, but I told him I wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice. Mr. Sheer had come to Malverne shortly after finishing a tour on the Marshall Islands as a Peace Corps volunteer. It was Mr. Messinger—who, along with my parents, teachers both—taught me how to use words. And it was Mr. Sheer who taught me to see the world beyond the South Shore of Long Island.

Thoughts of my teachers came to me last month, when my colleague Clint Smith, in his hometown for a book reading, tweeted the following: “On Colbert last week I mentioned my 3rd grade teacher, Ms. Mueller, who after reading a poem I wrote, told me I could be a writer when I grew up. I never forgot those words. So what an utter delight when I looked up from the signing table in New Orleans and saw Ms. Mueller there!” He attached a photo of himself and Ms. Mueller. Both are beaming, as they should be.

Today is National Teacher Appreciation Day.