A month or so ago, we were eating as a family in the cafeteria at the university where my husband teaches, and we saw Dr. Marshall, our neighbor. He was looking smart, still dressed in his suit from church, and we asked him to join us at our table. He is somewhat of a legend in the making at our university, with a faculty award already named after him.

It was great to see him. Since he also lives in university housing, like we do, he lives on our street. Right across the street, in fact. Since the day he moved in, he's been my favorite neighbor. Friendly and always up to something interesting. He lives alone, visiting his grown children often, and always has a sweet smile and an interesting fact to share with my children. He is a teacher, through and through.

One day, he had invited the kids over to watch him work on an old roadster that he was building from scratch. I was pretty surprised to find that a business economist academic was also so amazingly skilled at metalworking and building. He was pretty much a white-blue-everything–collar man.

from left: Dr. Marshall, my dh, Charlie, and Claire Ellen

He is always teaching us every time we talk, whether describing the declining health of the tree in our front yard or explaining to the children why seatbelt laws were invented and the sociological difference they have made (while giving them a spin in his Model-A Ford).

During lunch, Charlie mentioned that he was heading into the fifth grade. Dr. Marshall said, "Well, if you need any advice about the fifth grade, you can ask me. I did it twice!" We all laughed. Surely Dr. Marshall was kidding. "No, really," he insisted. "I repeated fifth grade." I gave him an incredulous look. Why on earth would that be? "You see," he explained to us cheerfully, "I couldn't read very well. I have something called dyslexia." He looked at my children, ready as always to teach them something fascinating. But was he surprised to hear Claire Ellen pipe up, "Me too!" Then Charlie nodded, "We're both dyslexic!"

Suddenly, my dh and I were outsiders. The three dyslexics were the insiders, and they all connected on a special, delightful level as they chatted about the challenges and benefits of their learning style. It was a great thing to watch. My children are forming their identities still. They are discovering who they are, who God created them to be. And sitting before them was another person "like" them, a person they could look up to and be inspired by.

Later, Dr. Marshall came over with some information about dyslexia camp (who knew that existed?), and he shared with us a bit of his "dyslexia story," which he had written down for another purpose earlier. An excerpt from his story gives a perfect example of the wonders as well as the frustrations of this amazing learning style. This is from his college years:

I was a math major and math was easy for me. Math had always been easy for me; it was back in military school that I discovered I had a gift for teaching math. I had to take plane geometry from my uncle and I wanted to make sure that I didn't put him in the uncomfortable position of flunking his nephew, and being good at math I wanted to make sure everybody knew I wasn't receiving any preferential treatment. 

I vowed to study plane geometry religiously to meet the obligation I had set for myself. It turned out that wasn't necessary; plane geometry was the best course I ever took in all my years of education. It all made perfect sense, I understood everything, I would read the book but it wasn't necessary because I could do every problem in the book with an ease I had never experienced before. 

Many of my classmates struggled with plane geometry and I would offer them help. I'd never before been able to help anybody with an academic subject, word quickly spread so any of my classmates who were having trouble came to me for help, it was then that I decided I wanted to be a teacher. 

I had a perfect average in plane geometry until I took the final. I was certain I made 100 on the final but the posted grade was 93. I knocked on the class room door, my uncle said “enter,” and I stood at attention before him and told him I was certain I had made 100 on the final. He told me I was wrong and handed me the final exam, I looked at the problem that I lost all seven points on and explained that it was worked correctly, my uncle said “no” I had done a proof for an inscribed quadrilateral, but the question required a proof for a circumscribed quadrilateral. 

My darn dyslexia had kept me from finishing the semester with a perfect average, but I had accomplished my goal and found what would be my life's work.