We can all just imagine how much teachers have to put up with on a day-to-day basis. Whether it's trying to get kids to behave for the duration of a 45-minute history class or having to argue with entitled parents about how special they think their offspring are, there is a whole lot more to being a teacher than… well, teaching. 

It's why the unbelievably unfair saying that "those who can't do teach" vastly misrepresents the number of things teachers have to juggle in order to effectively do their jobs well. All those graduate school dollars might help teachers devise lesson plans and learn various instruction methods, but we all know those skills end up amounting to a small portion of what the job actually entails. Much of one's time as a teacher, especially at the elementary and high school levels, involves politicking with the administration and with the school community.

This middle school teacher found herself at a crossroads when she couldn't get her kids to stop misbehaving and calling each other names during class. She worked at an institution that prided itself on positive reinforcement. No one was ever allowed to acknowledge that bad behavior was happening in the classroom; they could only promote the good stuff. This inevitably led to a problem because while punitive treatment is, of course, not ideal, students need to learn that they cannot treat one another poorly.

So this author decided to go against the administration's guidelines and instead instituted a new policy in her classroom that would reward classmates who treated one another with respect while keeping track of students who did the opposite. When I was a student, this would have been considered normal and justified. However, that did not seem to be the case at this school. Keep scrolling below for the full story and for the best reactions from several members of this online community.

Your answer says a lot about who you are as a person… Or perhaps an elf, hobbit, dwarf, or maybe a Nazgûl. Obviously, humanity is more nuanced than the boiled-down species and archetypes in The Lord of the Rings. In truth, there's a small part of all of us that's more hobbit than human, secretly yearning for 11 meals a day, lighthearted outdoor adventures, and the hard-earned peace of early retirement. None of us truly wants to work, hurry, or be busy all the time; we want our biggest dramas of the day to be about stolen carrots and poorly timed dragon fireworks. 

Then, of course, the voice of Gollum appears in our heads, summoning us to fulfill our oath to society, clock in to our 9-5 jobs, and pay our taxes like a good little citizen. Alas, it's for this reason that LOTR fans escape into the pages or the extended editions of Tolkien's Middle Earth universe. It's here in a world of good and evil, where decisions are simplified. Bad guys are bad, and good guys are good. Heroes charge into battle on horseback, revealing their quality, but they also carry cast-iron skillets for hundreds of miles. Shield maidens fight side-by-side with their men, and elven witches strike fear in our hearts with spooky monologues. 

Escaping into the world of the One Ring of power reminds us of all things good, evil, and in-between, helping us tackle our real-life problems with the mindset of a wizard, an elf, a ranger, or a hobbit gardener. When we channel the characteristics of our favorite characters in LOTR, suddenly our day-to-day lives as human beings on planet earth don't seem so tough anymore. For that, Tolkien, we all thank you. For he built a world so utterly magical and perfectly destroyed that it made our own broken world make more sense in the process. 

So if you're facing a blight of foul weather on the horizon, don't forget that you always have the option of adventure in your home, with your 4k box set of The Lord of the Rings and a delivery pizza. Like Gandalf always says, "The world is not in your books and maps. It's out there."