I simply cannot call my former teachers by their first names

I had forgotten the fact that virtually all of my male teachers in the 70s and 80s used to wear coats and ties to school every day.

Over the last couple of years, I've enjoyed writing a series of "Where Are They Now?" articles for my high school alumni association newsletter.

These pieces, as you might imagine, spotlight a retired teacher, administrator and/or coach who spent a significant number of years working within our school district.

I love connecting with these folks. Their stories are uniformly interesting to me, from the reasons they originally got into education to their favorite memories at Wickliffe to the things they've been doing since retirement.

I relish forming new and deeper connections with people who had such an impact on my life many years ago. I end up feeling much closer to them now than I ever could have as a student back in the 1980s.

That familiarity, however, only goes so far. More than once when I've gotten on the phone to interview them and said "Hello, Mrs. ______________!" I have been admonished to call them by their first names.

"You've been out of school for a long time now. Call me ___________________," is the type of thing they will say.

Each time, though, I politely refuse. I realize these former authority figures don't hold the same place in my life now as they did way back when, but I still admire each of them deeply. And to me, it will always be Mr./Mrs. Last Name and never, ever "Pat" or "Dan" or "Barbara" or "Bill" or whatever the case may be.

I just can't do it. I could no sooner be on a first-name basis with them as I could with the Pope.

I'll bet most people my age can identify with this feeling. I'm one to tell my kids' friends to call me by my first name, especially once they graduate, but there's a part of me that resists doing the same for my old teachers and coaches.

Call it deep respect, even reverence. I will always consider myself to be one or two notches lower than them in the hierarchy of adult relationships.

Which I think says something about the high esteem to which we should hold educators in our society.