With five children, the odds of our children getting a teacher who has taught a sibling are pretty high. Being obnoxious parents who call, send e-mails and have teacher conferences, we get to know our children’s teachers. This year, one of the children has a teacher who we’ve known for years. He has been in our house, we’ve been in his and we see each other at non-school activities almost every week. One of the children had a question about an assignment and wanted to call this teacher. At home. On a school holiday. I torpedoed the child’s plan and proceeded to lecture a blank faced child who wasn’t listening to a single word out of my mouth. I think that at home, teachers are husbands, wives, parents, scout leaders, little league coaches and a thousand other things. They are teachers at school. My grandmother was a teacher. Students called her at home and she happily helped them. She even went to students’ homes. I think that was above and beyond the call of duty, but it was her choice. Maybe if a teacher hands you their home phone number and actually says “call me at home” it’s occasionally okay, but as a general rule, I still say no. What about elected officials? We don’t own them. They have personal lives that are not our business. They have e-mails, work numbers and cell phones. Leave them alone at home. Don’t even get me started on stalkers who get to harass people if they call themselves paparazzi.