...how does this happen...

They really do think I'm their mom.

A couple of weeks ago I was in another teacher's room.  He was grading and recording assignments.  Frustrated, he showed me one without a name on it.  I told him whose it was after a quick glance.  He looked at me incredulously.  I had never seen his class list.  Indeed that was the only student without a grade.

I have a pile of books, notebooks, etc. that students have left in my room.  If I notice them, I stick them in a pile by the pencil sharpener.  No one ever looks to see if their missing items are there.  Today, I was very mom-like...I got sick of the pile, so I found out where all these delinquent students were, and hand-delivered their belongings.
One notebook didn't have a name on it.  It didn't matter.  I knew whose it was.  That's right.  I knew.  As I went downstairs to deliver it, I realized that it was a waste of my time.  Her flight to Texas left at 10 am today.  She wasn't at school.

Yesterday, I was talking with a student in class.  He was a little fired up about something, which is a pretty common occurrence with this young man. (I don't remember what it was about; that's how much this was not a big deal)  I'm not sure if I wasn't responding fast enough to him, or he was disagreeing with me, or what, but his reaction:  MOM!  Yep.  He called me mom.  Loudly.  In front of 26 other students.

Passing period.  Crying girl walks by.  I call her into my room.  I instantly become the sound board for the relationship drama, even though I have unabashedly encouraged the end of this relationship for over a year.

Today is the first home game for the freshmen boy's basketball team.  Twice I had a team member say to me "Miss O'Brien, are you going to my game tonight?" (Note:  my game, not our game, or the team's game, but my game)  Really?  And when I said I wasn't going, both students got upset and offended (mind you, these were two separate occasions).  One required consolation by way of promising I would go to one of his games this season, just not today.

How have I become a mother to hundreds of children to whom I did not give birth?  I certainly did not adopt any of them.  Heck, they've never even been to my house.  They don't even know what town it's in.