August Column Winner

A shining light... dimmed too soon

By Jeff Mullin, Enid News & Eagle

I may not look it from the photo accompanying this opus, but I am old.

OK, so I do look it. You don’t have to be so honest.

Anyway, as an old person I grew up with black and white TV, rabbit ear antennas and black, rotary dial phones, so I am a newbie in the world of modern technology.

As a result I have limited myself to one form of social media — Facebook (or The Facebook, as a friend of mine calls it).

I haven’t availed myself of TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Reddit or whatever the heck they call Twitter now.

I primarily use Facebook to view photos of the kids of friends and relatives — from birthdays, first and last days of school, that sort of thing.

Occasionally I run across posts that make me chuckle, make me mad or make me say “For crying out loud.”

But not long ago I ran across one that nearly made me literally cry out loud.

The post in question was the announcement of the death of Louisa McCune. The Enid native and Enid High grad was gone at the tender age of 54, felled by cancer. I never even knew she was sick.

Besides being friends in real life, Louisa and I were Facebook friends, which is decidedly not the same thing, but it allowed me to share in a bit of her life.

She never posted about her illness on Facebook, at least not that I saw. Instead she shared photos of her three beloved sons, her home, her patio, her animals, her garden, her friends and her causes.

She was a philanthropist, a writer, an editor and a tireless advocate for animals — and not just for cute, fuzzy animals like dogs and cats. She also cared for the animals we raise for our dinner tables, like pigs, cattle and chickens.

It is said that when our pets die they cross into the afterlife by way of the Rainbow Bridge. I’d like to think Louisa crossed that span recently, to a cacophony of woofs, meows, squeals, moos and clucks.

I have never seen an outpouring of love and affection such as I witnessed on Facebook following Louisa’s death.

In his tribute, Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt wrote “Louisa did so much, but probably it is her work on behalf of animals that will be most remembered. I can tell you, without Louisa’s advocacy, the city’s new state of the art animal shelter would likely not have made MAPS 4.”

Perhaps it would be a good idea for Mayor Holt to recommend naming that facility in memory of Louisa.

I have known Louisa ever since we worked together decades ago at this newspaper.

She was a delight to work with, inquisitive, bright, funny and warm. One evening she looked hard at me, screwed up her face in thought and said “Jeff Mullin. Are you any relation to Mrs. Mullin?”

I said only by marriage, since I was Mrs. Mullin’s Mister. Louisa then filled me in on a fact I already knew, she had been one of my bride’s math students at what was then Emerson Junior High School.

My wife loved Louisa, it was nigh onto impossible not to. But she had a succinct assessment of her as a student, “She was a motormouth. I had to send her out in the hall I don’t know how many times.”

As Louisa confessed to me that evening at work, during one of those punitive visits to the school corridor, she carved her initials on the wood trim on the wall outside my bride’s classroom. Even at a young age Louisa was making her mark.

When she left Enid, Louisa moved to New York City, where she worked for a variety of magazines, including George, founded by John F. Kennedy Jr.

During a trip to NYC my bride and I arranged to meet Louisa and her hometown pal Candice Autry, who likewise was residing in New York at the time. We arranged to meet the young women in Washington Square Park in lower Manhattan. They took us on a walking tour, pointing out the sights before taking us to an authentic New York pizza parlor in SoHo, which they informed us stood for “south of Houston Street,” pronounced How-ston, not like the city in Texas.

We’ve been to New York several times since, but that particular day is the one that stands out in my memory.

When Louisa first returned to her home state she served as editor of Oklahoma Today magazine. In those days I used to run into her at Oklahoma Press Association events, but when she became executive director of the Kirkpatrick Foundation our paths rarely crossed.

The last time I saw her was not long before I retired. She was in town for some reason and stopped by the newspaper. We hugged and reminisced for a while, then she announced she wanted to take my picture. I protested, but she insisted, and you didn’t say no to Louisa. So I stood there like a doofus in the newsroom as she snapped my photo with her phone. We parted and I never saw her again.

The day Louisa’s obit appeared in the News and Eagle I heard my bride weeping behind the paper. Louisa had that effect on people.

Louisa McCune died too young. Heck, everybody dies too young, no matter how old they are, but in her case it was really true. But in her short 54 years she made a difference. She left a legacy that will be felt for decades. She left the world a better place than she found it.

If you knew her, honor her memory by doing your best to make a difference wherever you can. And if you didn’t know her, I’m sorry.