Being Part of a Family That Isn’t My Own

As a teacher at Lessons In Your Home, we become part of the families we teach. After all, we go into our students’ homes once each week, and while it’s only for a short time, the consistency is enough to make us feel like part of the family’s dynamic — at least the dynamic while we’re there.

Being part of a family other than my own is a big part of my story. When I started teaching piano lessons in Atlanta in 1997, I was 25 — unmarried, without children, and very, very green to teaching. My first students came from a friend’s request: her best friend was a nanny for two children who needed a piano teacher. I had no idea how much being part of a family other than my own would shape my life and eventually become the beginning of a music school — Lessons In Your Home.

Over time, I watched, learned, and supported students as they grew from cute five-year-olds into smelly teenagers — all while learning to play an instrument. Their parents would often share with me the ups and downs of what their families were going through. Maybe their child didn’t make the same soccer team as their best friend, or they were embarrassed about not practicing for their lesson.

I’d get gentle reminders like, “Can you go easy on Samantha today? She’s had a tough week at school and didn’t get much time on the piano.” These little speed bumps became something I learned to navigate alongside the family — student, sibling, parent, and, in my own small way, me.

As I continued teaching many families — being their “favorite teacher” (ha) — I’d share the lessons I was learning with my fiancée. We’d talk about how we’d handle the situations I encountered: “Would we raise our children the same way? Had we really considered everything a parent goes through?”

I’m eternally grateful for all the experiences I had as a teacher — for all the families I got to be part of, and for how those relationships shaped who I am today.

When I eventually had children of my own and our school grew to the point where I needed to focus on running the business and being a present parent, I had to reassign all my students to other teachers on our staff. By that time, we had an amazing team of educators who welcomed the opportunity to become part of their students’ families, just as I had once been.

During that transition, there were letters — from parents to me, and from me to them. I’m 6’2″ and 245 pounds, but I teared up at every last lesson. By that point, I didn’t just have students — I had families.

To this day, at Lessons In Your Home, we use the word families intentionally. Other schools might call them customers or accounts, but to us, they’re families. We’re family.

Every time I run into an old student or a parent, I ask what they remember about lessons. Sometimes the memories make me laugh — like the young man who remembered me making him march around his living room (he can’t remember why, but he remembers the marching). And sometimes, the memories give me goosebumps — like the former student who told me she’ll always have a piano in her home because music brings her peace. She has children of her own now and thanked me for being the person who shared that with her.

My father told me when I was just a kid, during a drive one day, that family was the most important thing in life. I always understood what he meant — I knew I had a good family — but I never knew how lucky I would be to become part of so many families.