I was sitting in math class; my teacher, Mrs. Gratz, trying to collect the attention of everyone arriving before the bell signified the beginning of the fourth period. As most of my classmates sat down and waited for our teacher to begin the lesson, like she has so many times before, a student walks in right after the bell rings. A seventh grader, just like me, but a particularly obnoxious one. It was painfully obvious to anyone who knew him that he didn’t care much about school or authority. He continues walking through the quietly buzzing classroom and sits down next to one of his friends and begins loudly talking with him. At this point our teacher has attempted to quiet everyone down multiple times, succeeding with just about everyone except for him. There was no mistaking that he was in a bad mood, acting oblivious to the teachers commands to pay attention and now, starting to cause quite a scene. I watched with my classmates, as the increasingly disruptive situation unfolded. Arguing with a teacher for seemingly no reason and causing a scene, I could see on my teacher’s face that she was getting more and more upset as time went on, and more of her class time was wasted. 

    I find it very important to portray yourself in a positive way to superiors, people that can have an effect on your life and people that are in charge of you. Parents, police officers, teachers. The ones that reside in positions such as these are the ones that demand and deserve the most respect, even if you don’t think so. Watching a young man argue back and forth with a teacher, a person of authority, and cause not only distress in that teacher, but discomfort in the students around him taught me a valuable lesson about how to act when in a situation like this. Even if you don’t want to do something, there is a time and place for everything and the time for wasting time is not during school and the place for disrupting a teacher’s lesson is not in school. I was taught this lesson on an ordinary day, and this scenario has stuck with me for quite a long time.    

    I try to respect all figures of authority, especially when they treat their subordinates fairly and with equal respect. If you simply act as though the world does not revolve around you, you’ll find that it’s not hard to show a little respect where respect is due. I think the way I absorbed this back in 7th grade is the reason I still remember it and still learn from it to this day. I find that life is so much easier if you don’t choose to make things difficult, just sit down and pay attention. In conclusion, I was taught a valuable lesson that is not only a lesson that everyone should be taught, but is a lesson that I have used many times in my life. This lesson was given to me through an unfortunate event, but I believe that you can find something of value through many things, even if you wouldn’t think so at first. I surely didn’t think that this person would be teaching me anything in the brief time I knew him, I mostly just tried to ignore him but as it turns out, that was not the case, and I was really able to gain something from seemingly another obnoxious exhibition of how long he can argue with the teacher in the morning. Sitting in class and listening to the teacher everyday can get hard and boring but it is also worth quieting down for because of what you can take away from the class, and what you can gain from just showing some respect.