Mrs. Mullican, Champion of the Discarded

Submitted by: Jared, CO

If you do not understand a man you cannot crush him. And if you do understand him, very probably you will not. – GK Chesterton

Editor’s Note/Disclaimer: One night, the mister and I were sitting at the dinner table discussing this project. I asked him who he’d write about if he had to choose. He thought, smiled, and then told me the story below. I put pen to paper after our chat, and here we are. While he’s a very private person, I’m grateful he has allowed me to share this piece of his life, both for the person who impacted him, and for others who may have, at some point, experienced the same. Enjoy.  Xo- Cami

I learned to come out swinging at an early age, ready to kick the world’s ass.

I knew very young that my path would be anything but typical. I was an athletically-inclined kid with a penchant for risk. My parents pulled me off the fourth rung of a ladder at two years old and then were pulled aside by Child Protective Services when I brought an entire high chair down on my face. I rode my trike in my birthday suit on a cold Oklahoma Christmas morning, eager to test out my new wheels, and I went to the ER as a youngster several times—not the least of which was a failed tuck and roll out of Mom’s moving minivan in attempt to do my own stunts. God bless my mother—I’m still not entirely sure how she endured my shenanigans.

It was likely a combination of the love of my family, sports, my mom’s advocacy, my dad’s patience, and a bit of my own stubbornness that a) kept me out of jail and b) allowed me to survive adolescence and graduate from high school.

That, and a few years with Mrs. Mullican.  

In the same years that I fell in love with athletics, spending hours hitting baseballs with my Pops or shooting hoops with him at church, I HATED school. Every day was a hostage negotiation with my mom to get dressed to go to class, pulling my ninja turtle sheets up to my chin and staring longingly at the Michael Jordan poster on my wall. I recall the pit in my stomach on Sunday evenings with remarkable clarity, along with the triumphant wind on my face as I pressed open the big metal double doors every June on the last day of school.

My teachers didn’t know what to do with me. One was concerned when I played in the dirt by myself, while another said I “daydreamed too much,” excessively gazing out the window. I did a victory lap in first grade, repeating the year and eventually being relegated to “lab class” thereafter, where I met Mrs. Mullican.

Mrs. Mullican sported a sort of timeless look, her long, brown hair all one length swept past her shoulders and simply paired with bulky sweaters and wire-rimmed glasses—a unique combination that made her warm and approachable while still meaning business and commanding respect.

Every week, the “lab class” kids were pulled out of our classrooms, a double-edged sword that both singled us out and gave us the extra instruction we needed to survive in the conventional school system. We were a rag-tag, rambunctious group of boys, frustrated by reading, writing, and sitting still, and she met us with her soft-spoken, kind demeanor, exactly where we were.

She knew instinctively that traditional assignments just wouldn’t do, and she found our kryptonite. She allowed us to write letters to our favorite professional athletes, teaching us grammar along the way, and reveled in our triumph when we received responses back as if we’d won the Pulitzer Prize. She used tactile, three-dimensional examples to help us conceptualize that which was so difficult to get from a book’s pages. If we felt frustration or restlessness, we were allowed to step outside and get some fresh air, sitting on the cushy bean bag chair she provided or squeezing stress balls, equipment she undoubtedly bought for us out of her own funds. Then we’d return, refreshed and ready to try again. At a time in my life when it seemed most teachers had given up on my ability to learn, I was valued as a precious little human who had the capability to succeed if given the right tools. It was one of the only times in a classroom where I felt my own worth. It wasn’t that any of us were incapable; we just needed to find a different way with someone who was willing to help us try to find it.

Somewhere in there, I was diagnosed with dysgraphia and dyslexia, a learning disability mixture that makes it painfully difficult to bring what is in one’s brain on to paper, as well as to read instructional text and translate into the tactile. My time with Mrs. Mullican in my youth was a bright spot in a storm of misunderstanding that was my childhood education, and in subsequent years, her voice became the salve that enabled me to persevere when other adults in my educational experience told me I’d never be capable enough to attend college.

As previously mentioned, it’s been a long, winding road, and I knew early on I’d never take the typical path. I eventually ended up with undergraduate and graduate degrees. More important, though, I developed a love for the outdoors and a desire to share that passion with others. I learned to teach skills in many non-traditional ways, identifying often with the disabled and, sometimes, the discarded, and there is always a workaround to create a safe, rewarding experience. Thanks in large part to the grace that was shown to me at an early age, I too am able to meet students exactly where they are and try to find a way to success, and more important, to develop the same love and passion in what they’re doing that took me so long to find. Thank you, Mrs. Mullican, for seeing through the disability to that which was possible.