Back to School Night (The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree)

Everyone should have the opportunity of being a teacher at Back-to-School Night. For the first few weeks of school you have all these kids that you can’t figure out. Then Back-to-School Night comes along and everything becomes clear. You see these older versions of your kids sitting in your room – some of them in the same seats their kids choose. We have a saying in education, it’s “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” And it is really true.
It’s been a long one. I got to school around 8:30 this morning. It’s now about 9:45 p.m. and I’m on the train going home. Mr. Burns had to rescue me. Most of my classes only had a handful of parents in them. One class had only two parents out of a class of more than twenty. My last class, however, was my honors class and there weren’t enough seats for all the parents. They wanted to stay and talk, too. Mr. Burns came by my room like I was riding home with him. Even then, one of the moms kept talking to us. She followed us all the way out of the building and to Mr. Burns’ car. We’ll have to watch out for that one. She could be trouble. Mr. Burns dropped me at the train station. He’s nice like that.
Graffiti boy was still in class today. I was not happy. After school the principal came by and explained that they just talked about the graffiti today and now he’s suspended. He’s been suspended pending a parent conference. Hopefully, that means he’ll be out of school for a while. Last year the parent would call the school to yell at someone and that would count as the conference. Then, the kid would be right back in your class. I guess we’ll see what "parent conference" means this year. Apparently, the school cop had a good talk with graffiti boy and scared some sense into him.
In other news, I have my name, "Mr. Moore" posted outside the door to my classroom. Someone wrote an “H” over the "M" in "Moore".