Lynda Evelyn Leonard
Birth: 11 Oct 1940, Alameda, California
Death: 28 Sept 2023, Escondido, California
Spouse: John Francis Baeyertz
Birth: 7 Apr 1939, San Diego, California
Marriage: 7 Jul 1962, Los Angeles, California
Divorce: Sep 1976, San Diego, California, USA
Children: Leah Marie (1959-)
Vandy Malinda (1962-)
Death: 28 Sept 2023, Escondido, California
Spouse: John Francis Baeyertz
Birth: 7 Apr 1939, San Diego, California
Marriage: 7 Jul 1962, Los Angeles, California
Divorce: Sep 1976, San Diego, California, USA
Children: Leah Marie (1959-)
Vandy Malinda (1962-)
Lynda was born on October 11, 1940. She was one of several only-children in her generation. She always wanted siblings and would ask about having a little brother or sister. Her father had wanted more children, but her mother had health issues, and the War made the future uncertain, so they decided to not have another child. Lynda was born in Berkeley and lived her first seven years in the East Bay. In 1947, John was transferred to Southern California, and the family first moved to Torrance and then to Long Beach.
Lynda described Long Beach as “an idyllic neighborhood to raise a family.” It was just two blocks from the beach and the Marina. During the summer, the street would be blocked off to traffic, and people would walk to the marina to swim, to get snacks at Woody’s Goodies, and to lie out in the street to tan and dry off. There were two theatres nearby, and Lynda remembered that the fancy one cost 25¢ but a short bike ride away was a theatre that only cost 9¢. There were many other families on the block, and Linda had many friends, both in the neighborhood and at school. Lynda said she was always social and would get depressed if she was alone for too long.
Summers were spent at Russian River with the Coogan cousins. Linda was about the same age as Sandy Scattini and Toni Lynn Gallagher. Lynda says she loved the River. She was also close to her cousin Joan Thomas, who was a year younger. The got into a lot of mischief together.
Linda had a happy childhood, but she was known for having a bit of a temper. She would storm through the house slamming doors and her father would say, “She’s just like my mother.” Kate Silk Leonard had quite the temper as well, apparently. Lynda said later in life that she never really lost that streak, although she learned to hold it in for longer periods of time. She did break a door in her condo, though, by slamming it too often.
Linda’s parents were devout Catholics, particularly her father. He took the family to mass every Sunday. St. Bartholomew’s was the closest church to home, but the family often went to St. Matthew’s because they had an early mass. They kept meatless Fridays and gave up various things during Lent. Lynda remembered that her mother prayed, but she did not pay much attention during Mass.
Linda’s father valued education and made sure she had an excellent, Catholic one. He sent her to St. Bartholomew’s Grammar School and St. Anthony’s High School in Long Beach. St. Anthony’s had been founded as a coeducational school in 1920 by the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart. But in 1940, the Brothers of Holy Cross joined the Sisters, and St. Anthony’s became two separate, single-sex schools on the same campus, with separate facilities dedicated to each. (The schools would merge back into one coed school in 1972.) Linda would go through her junior year at St Anthony’s.
During her junior year, Linda and a friend were fixed up on a blind double-date. Early on, her friend wanted to trade dates, much to the boys’ chagrin. Linda’s new partner was a boy named Hank McCuthem, and he became the first “love of her life.” They became quite serious, to the point that her father was worried that she was not spending enough time and energy on her school work in preparation for college. Jack decided to send her to Marywood High School, an exclusive all-girls college prep boarding school in Anaheim, for her senior year. She actually did not mind that much. The school was small—33 students in the senior class—and one of her friends from St. Anthony’s transferred with her. As an only child, she enjoyed living with other teenagers. It was like suddenly having a lot of sisters. There were even girls from Mexico who came to improve their English, and Linda learned some Spanish from them as well. They did not have any classes in art, which Linda really wanted to study. Her father went to the principal and told her he would pull his daughter out if they did not provide some kind of art experience for Linda, so she got individual tutoring from one old nun. Linda graduated from Marywood in 1958.
She and Hank continued to date, but, unfortunately, they had different aspirations for life. Rather than being a college man, he wanted to join the Navy, which he did. They broke up when he was shipped out to Hawaii.
Linda enrolled at Long Beach State that fall. She thought about nursing school but decided to major in Fine Arts. Like her cousin Dolores, Linda loved to paint and decorate. Her father went to the art store with the supplies list, asked to see the owner, and peppered him with questions to make sure his daughter had the best tools at hand. He even set up a painting area on their sundeck where she could use the natural like to mix her colors. As Linda waited in line for 8 hours to register for classes, she met another young woman also named Linda Leonard. That Linda was an actress in the theatre department and a sorority girl. Our Lynda decided to start spelling her name with a y to distinguish herself.
On the rebound from Hank, Lynda went to a party where she met a football player and had a brief fling. She became pregnant. There was a meeting with the parents, and her father wanted her to marry the young man, but Lynda knew there was not a future there. Hank returned home on leave and, hearing from a mutual friend that she was eight months pregnant, he still wanted to see her. They went out to dinner almost every night. Hank proposed. Not sure what to do, Lynda followed her mother’s advice and went to talk to the parish priest. Luckily, Fr. Garcia was an enlightened man, and he recommended that she wait until after Leah was born before deciding what to do.
Leah was born in July of 1959. A fictitious name—Sterling—was listed as the father’s name on her birth certificate. There was never any question that Lynda would keep Leah rather than give her up for adoption. Now she decided to not involve the father nor to marry Hank. She raised Leah in her parents’ house, while she continued her education. Lynda remembered that her father and his father-in-law built a low wall around the yard where Leah could play and call “Hello” to passers-by. She was a happy and social child.
Lynda would later say that she was lucky in that she always had a love interest and that they never overlapped. She said, “Two men at the same time would have been too complicated.” Back at school one day, she was in the Art building, which was one story in front where the drafting boards were, a pottery studio downstairs in back, and a loft above the pottery rooms for easels. She was in a Life Drawing class upstairs, talking to a high school friend. The friend was telling her about a young advertising illustrator who was smart, handsome, and outspoken, who got into interesting debates with the professors. She looked down from the loft and said, “There he is,” pointing to a young man in a white shirt and Bermuda shorts. He was John Baeyertz.
Lynda described Long Beach as “an idyllic neighborhood to raise a family.” It was just two blocks from the beach and the Marina. During the summer, the street would be blocked off to traffic, and people would walk to the marina to swim, to get snacks at Woody’s Goodies, and to lie out in the street to tan and dry off. There were two theatres nearby, and Lynda remembered that the fancy one cost 25¢ but a short bike ride away was a theatre that only cost 9¢. There were many other families on the block, and Linda had many friends, both in the neighborhood and at school. Lynda said she was always social and would get depressed if she was alone for too long.
Summers were spent at Russian River with the Coogan cousins. Linda was about the same age as Sandy Scattini and Toni Lynn Gallagher. Lynda says she loved the River. She was also close to her cousin Joan Thomas, who was a year younger. The got into a lot of mischief together.
Linda had a happy childhood, but she was known for having a bit of a temper. She would storm through the house slamming doors and her father would say, “She’s just like my mother.” Kate Silk Leonard had quite the temper as well, apparently. Lynda said later in life that she never really lost that streak, although she learned to hold it in for longer periods of time. She did break a door in her condo, though, by slamming it too often.
Linda’s parents were devout Catholics, particularly her father. He took the family to mass every Sunday. St. Bartholomew’s was the closest church to home, but the family often went to St. Matthew’s because they had an early mass. They kept meatless Fridays and gave up various things during Lent. Lynda remembered that her mother prayed, but she did not pay much attention during Mass.
Linda’s father valued education and made sure she had an excellent, Catholic one. He sent her to St. Bartholomew’s Grammar School and St. Anthony’s High School in Long Beach. St. Anthony’s had been founded as a coeducational school in 1920 by the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart. But in 1940, the Brothers of Holy Cross joined the Sisters, and St. Anthony’s became two separate, single-sex schools on the same campus, with separate facilities dedicated to each. (The schools would merge back into one coed school in 1972.) Linda would go through her junior year at St Anthony’s.
During her junior year, Linda and a friend were fixed up on a blind double-date. Early on, her friend wanted to trade dates, much to the boys’ chagrin. Linda’s new partner was a boy named Hank McCuthem, and he became the first “love of her life.” They became quite serious, to the point that her father was worried that she was not spending enough time and energy on her school work in preparation for college. Jack decided to send her to Marywood High School, an exclusive all-girls college prep boarding school in Anaheim, for her senior year. She actually did not mind that much. The school was small—33 students in the senior class—and one of her friends from St. Anthony’s transferred with her. As an only child, she enjoyed living with other teenagers. It was like suddenly having a lot of sisters. There were even girls from Mexico who came to improve their English, and Linda learned some Spanish from them as well. They did not have any classes in art, which Linda really wanted to study. Her father went to the principal and told her he would pull his daughter out if they did not provide some kind of art experience for Linda, so she got individual tutoring from one old nun. Linda graduated from Marywood in 1958.
She and Hank continued to date, but, unfortunately, they had different aspirations for life. Rather than being a college man, he wanted to join the Navy, which he did. They broke up when he was shipped out to Hawaii.
Linda enrolled at Long Beach State that fall. She thought about nursing school but decided to major in Fine Arts. Like her cousin Dolores, Linda loved to paint and decorate. Her father went to the art store with the supplies list, asked to see the owner, and peppered him with questions to make sure his daughter had the best tools at hand. He even set up a painting area on their sundeck where she could use the natural like to mix her colors. As Linda waited in line for 8 hours to register for classes, she met another young woman also named Linda Leonard. That Linda was an actress in the theatre department and a sorority girl. Our Lynda decided to start spelling her name with a y to distinguish herself.
On the rebound from Hank, Lynda went to a party where she met a football player and had a brief fling. She became pregnant. There was a meeting with the parents, and her father wanted her to marry the young man, but Lynda knew there was not a future there. Hank returned home on leave and, hearing from a mutual friend that she was eight months pregnant, he still wanted to see her. They went out to dinner almost every night. Hank proposed. Not sure what to do, Lynda followed her mother’s advice and went to talk to the parish priest. Luckily, Fr. Garcia was an enlightened man, and he recommended that she wait until after Leah was born before deciding what to do.
Leah was born in July of 1959. A fictitious name—Sterling—was listed as the father’s name on her birth certificate. There was never any question that Lynda would keep Leah rather than give her up for adoption. Now she decided to not involve the father nor to marry Hank. She raised Leah in her parents’ house, while she continued her education. Lynda remembered that her father and his father-in-law built a low wall around the yard where Leah could play and call “Hello” to passers-by. She was a happy and social child.
Lynda would later say that she was lucky in that she always had a love interest and that they never overlapped. She said, “Two men at the same time would have been too complicated.” Back at school one day, she was in the Art building, which was one story in front where the drafting boards were, a pottery studio downstairs in back, and a loft above the pottery rooms for easels. She was in a Life Drawing class upstairs, talking to a high school friend. The friend was telling her about a young advertising illustrator who was smart, handsome, and outspoken, who got into interesting debates with the professors. She looked down from the loft and said, “There he is,” pointing to a young man in a white shirt and Bermuda shorts. He was John Baeyertz.
John Francis Baeyertz was born on April 7, 1939. His father Frank Phelps Baeyertz, an engineer and sales manager for GP (General Petroleum), was of English and German heritage. John’s mother was Mary Malinda Black of Tennessee. Jack, as he was known, had grown up in San Gabriel and attended Alhambra and San Gabriel High Schools, where he was a member of the Art Club. After graduation, he attended Pasadena City College and spent a semester at the University of New Mexico before transferring to Long Beach State. He was planning to enter the advertising field to become a fashion illustrator. He was excellent at painting and drawing. He lived at 166 Argonne Avenue in Long Beach with two other young men from Pasadena. One of their friends was Bob Mackey who would go on to a legendary career as the costume designer for the Carol Burnett Show. Lynda said he was a very nice man.
Lynda referred to Jack as “an honorable man. He never uttered a prejudiced word about anyone and was a good and gentle soul.” He was very shy and retiring, so Lynda had to pursue him. She would walk around the studio and look at his artwork over his shoulder, complimenting it and him. When they had classes together, she made sure that her easel was set up next to his. He finally asked her out on a date. She could not remember if they went to the ballet or the opera, but she remembered how serious he was about it all. She later said, “One date was all we needed.”
On July 7, 1962, Jack and Lynda married at St. Bartholomew Church in Long Beach. Jack was not Catholic and had to take classes to be married there. Jack adopted Leah and would raise her as his own. Initially, they lived at 1078 E 7th St. Apt 7 in Los Angeles. On December 28, 1962, Lynda gave birth to another girl who they named Vandy Malinda after Jack’s mother. After Vandy’s birth, they moved to the house at 16404 - 25th Street in Sunset Beach. (This was near his Aunt Mary, who had been like a third parent to him.) The house was among a strip of houses just cross the road from the beach. Over the next few years, they moved up and down the strip, each time upgrading their situation. When Vandy started at the Coop Pre-School, Lynda became the arts-and-crafts instructor.
Jack got a job in advertising, but the field was very cutthroat. He was laid off when his client base did not build quickly enough. Lynda’s father got him a job at Shell Oil as a laborer. The work was heavy and his shifts kept changing. To add to the difficulties, he needed his wisdom teeth pulled and then found out he had a kidney stone! The one good thing that came out of working at Shell was that the personnel department had him take an aptitude test, which revealed that he had a gift for—and an interest in—electronics. Shell gave him training as an electrical technician. He then went back to school at Cal State Northrup to earn a degree in electrical engineering. After graduating, Jack moved the family to Escondido. His parents had retired there, and he received a job offer with National Cash Register (NCR). While working for NCR, he would create a solderless circuit board capacitor for which he was awarded two patents in 1978.
For most of its history, Escondido, which is about 30 miles northeast of downtown San Diego, was an agricultural community. Initially, the main crop was muscat grapes. After a dam was built in 1894-5, citrus groves were planted, followed by walnut and olive trees. In the 1950s and 60s, avocados were becoming the primary crop. This period also saw the expansion of HWY 395 into I-15, more efficiently linking Riverside and the Inland Empire to San Diego. This led to much of the farm land in the early ‘70s being sold off to land developers. Housing tracts were going up in the newly expanding suburb, and the Baeyertzes were in on the ground floor, as it were. Escondido is still being marketed as a family suburb. Movoto.com (2016) says:
As a community between two of the largest metropolitan areas in the state of California, Escondido offers people a place to buy a home and raise a family affordably, while still having access to the beach and the near perfect weather that draws tens of millions to the region. Amtrak runs a train between Los Angeles and San Diego, allowing residents of Escondido to reach either city from their location in about an hour each way, and the trek via car is about that distance as well—not accounting for traffic of course. But most people who move to Escondido aren’t heading to either San Diego or Los Angeles very often. Whether you’re looking to settle down and start a family, continue a family in a less expensive and noisy environment or just find a reasonable place to retire, Escondido has a little bit of everything.
Run-on sentences aside, it sounds like a nice place to settle.
The girls both attended the new, excellent public schools in the area. Both graduated from Escondido High. During the summer, the family had easy access to the beach, the desert, Disneyland, and the Native American ruins in Arizona. Jack liked to camp, though Lynda said she always needed at least one night in a hotel. Vandy has very fond memories of their camping trips.
Lynda referred to Jack as “an honorable man. He never uttered a prejudiced word about anyone and was a good and gentle soul.” He was very shy and retiring, so Lynda had to pursue him. She would walk around the studio and look at his artwork over his shoulder, complimenting it and him. When they had classes together, she made sure that her easel was set up next to his. He finally asked her out on a date. She could not remember if they went to the ballet or the opera, but she remembered how serious he was about it all. She later said, “One date was all we needed.”
On July 7, 1962, Jack and Lynda married at St. Bartholomew Church in Long Beach. Jack was not Catholic and had to take classes to be married there. Jack adopted Leah and would raise her as his own. Initially, they lived at 1078 E 7th St. Apt 7 in Los Angeles. On December 28, 1962, Lynda gave birth to another girl who they named Vandy Malinda after Jack’s mother. After Vandy’s birth, they moved to the house at 16404 - 25th Street in Sunset Beach. (This was near his Aunt Mary, who had been like a third parent to him.) The house was among a strip of houses just cross the road from the beach. Over the next few years, they moved up and down the strip, each time upgrading their situation. When Vandy started at the Coop Pre-School, Lynda became the arts-and-crafts instructor.
Jack got a job in advertising, but the field was very cutthroat. He was laid off when his client base did not build quickly enough. Lynda’s father got him a job at Shell Oil as a laborer. The work was heavy and his shifts kept changing. To add to the difficulties, he needed his wisdom teeth pulled and then found out he had a kidney stone! The one good thing that came out of working at Shell was that the personnel department had him take an aptitude test, which revealed that he had a gift for—and an interest in—electronics. Shell gave him training as an electrical technician. He then went back to school at Cal State Northrup to earn a degree in electrical engineering. After graduating, Jack moved the family to Escondido. His parents had retired there, and he received a job offer with National Cash Register (NCR). While working for NCR, he would create a solderless circuit board capacitor for which he was awarded two patents in 1978.
For most of its history, Escondido, which is about 30 miles northeast of downtown San Diego, was an agricultural community. Initially, the main crop was muscat grapes. After a dam was built in 1894-5, citrus groves were planted, followed by walnut and olive trees. In the 1950s and 60s, avocados were becoming the primary crop. This period also saw the expansion of HWY 395 into I-15, more efficiently linking Riverside and the Inland Empire to San Diego. This led to much of the farm land in the early ‘70s being sold off to land developers. Housing tracts were going up in the newly expanding suburb, and the Baeyertzes were in on the ground floor, as it were. Escondido is still being marketed as a family suburb. Movoto.com (2016) says:
As a community between two of the largest metropolitan areas in the state of California, Escondido offers people a place to buy a home and raise a family affordably, while still having access to the beach and the near perfect weather that draws tens of millions to the region. Amtrak runs a train between Los Angeles and San Diego, allowing residents of Escondido to reach either city from their location in about an hour each way, and the trek via car is about that distance as well—not accounting for traffic of course. But most people who move to Escondido aren’t heading to either San Diego or Los Angeles very often. Whether you’re looking to settle down and start a family, continue a family in a less expensive and noisy environment or just find a reasonable place to retire, Escondido has a little bit of everything.
Run-on sentences aside, it sounds like a nice place to settle.
The girls both attended the new, excellent public schools in the area. Both graduated from Escondido High. During the summer, the family had easy access to the beach, the desert, Disneyland, and the Native American ruins in Arizona. Jack liked to camp, though Lynda said she always needed at least one night in a hotel. Vandy has very fond memories of their camping trips.
Lynda continued to paint and took classes in her free time. She preferred portraiture and often painted life-size versions of famous works. Her favorite product was a copy of Renoir’s La Loge. Vandy used to refer to it as “Mommy and Daddy.”
In 1970, with the girls both in school, Lynda decided to go back to school herself to pursue nursing. She considered going to into Oceanside Community College, but, because she wanted the best clinic work, she decided to attend San Diego Mesa College. She found school to be very difficult because she never tested well. She was assigned to a skilled nursing home for her fieldwork, which she enjoyed, but she became overwhelmed between school and mothering. She decided to drop out one semester short of graduating. Jack said she would regret quitting, but she could not continue the way it was going.
The mid-1970s were a “very bad time” for Lynda. She had gotten along well with her in-laws and had a good relationship with Malinda, in particular. They loved shopping together. But in 1974, Jack’s father Frank Baeyertz died. Around the same time, Lynda’s father was also having health problems, and Lynda herself was having some health difficulties as well. The stress of the grief, fear, and of long work-hours took its toll on the marriage. In 1975, Lynda moved out and took an apartment on East 3rd Avenue in town. She filed for divorce, and it became final in September of 1976. Jack Baeyertz would go on to marry a woman named Ruth Weiss, and they would remain together until her death in 2011. He and Lynda remained friendly.
Around this time, Lynda met the third love of her life—a doctor of Lebanese extract with whom she worked. He was a neurologist and psychiatrist who had earned his MD at Yale. Lynda often said that he saved her life and deserved a “place of honor” in her story. He helped her through the most difficult period of her life. They had a long-term relationship, but marriage was never in the cards. They parted as friends. Lynda said she always made it her policy to remain on good terms with the men who had been in her life.
Lynda landed a job as an emergency room clerk at the County Medical Center, doing billings and insurance for adults as they got released. Her father had insisted that she take some business classes to have something upon which to fall back. She did not type very quickly, but she did very well with medical terminology. She got promoted to accounts receivable, but she preferred working with patients instead of just office paperwork. As she said, “My specialty was always talking.” She especially liked working with teens.
In 1977, Lynda decided to return to school at Grossmont La Mesa to earn her practical nursing license. She had very good teachers there, but she got placed badly for her clinic hours. Her charges include the developmentally disabled, and Lynda was scared. The Down Syndrome patients could go out to work all day, but they could not do laundry or other basics at home. Lynda liked to be able to help, but dinners were some of the worst times, with food going everywhere. Leah was amazed she stuck it out.
In March of 1978, Lynda’s mother died. One way that she dealt with the grief was by working on getting her parents’ house ready to rent. She sold everything in the house except for a big console TV and a bed. Then she had the whole house painted inside and out. She rented it to three male college students. They were good tenants who never complained and fixed anything that needed fixing. They stayed there for the next four years, and then Lynda sold the house to the father of one of the tenants.
1980 was an eventful year. Vandy graduated high school, and Lynda earned both her nursing licenses (practical and vocational). She passed the vocational nursing test easily because of her experience, but she had little work experience in practical nursing (she said, “I didn’t even know which way the pillow goes.”) so that licensing test was much harder to pass. After receiving her license, Lynda took a job booking surgeries at the Tri-City Medical Center, a small hospital in Oceanside. She described the job as “horrendous.” But she did earn her certification to add IV and draw blood to her resume, which would later count toward a vocational nursing license. She went back to on-call emergency room work, including a stint in Compton. While interviewing for one job, she told the interviewer that what she did best was talk to people. The interviewer suggested she pursue a psychiatric technician credential. It seemed like a logical choice.
Knowing that the State board would require clinic hours, she hired on at Downtown Detox, in Chula Vista. Lynda said that she did not think many of the patients were serious about getting well, but rather, they “came in for the soup.” She liked Downtown Detox better than some of the places she was assigned when on-call for the county. Lynda often did not feel safe. One had very small rooms that felt particularly claustrophobic when a large person was brought in in restraints. At another place, there were snacks left out, and sometimes there was a cake. But the attendants would leave a big knife on the table for the cake. Not safe.
Over Easter while working at Downtown Detox, Lynda got sick again—this time with hepatitis—and was in the hospital. She was not going to make the same mistake as in 1970 and not finish her program. She did not tell them she was sick because they would have dropped her. A friendly nurse at the detox center signed off on her hours.
In 1970, with the girls both in school, Lynda decided to go back to school herself to pursue nursing. She considered going to into Oceanside Community College, but, because she wanted the best clinic work, she decided to attend San Diego Mesa College. She found school to be very difficult because she never tested well. She was assigned to a skilled nursing home for her fieldwork, which she enjoyed, but she became overwhelmed between school and mothering. She decided to drop out one semester short of graduating. Jack said she would regret quitting, but she could not continue the way it was going.
The mid-1970s were a “very bad time” for Lynda. She had gotten along well with her in-laws and had a good relationship with Malinda, in particular. They loved shopping together. But in 1974, Jack’s father Frank Baeyertz died. Around the same time, Lynda’s father was also having health problems, and Lynda herself was having some health difficulties as well. The stress of the grief, fear, and of long work-hours took its toll on the marriage. In 1975, Lynda moved out and took an apartment on East 3rd Avenue in town. She filed for divorce, and it became final in September of 1976. Jack Baeyertz would go on to marry a woman named Ruth Weiss, and they would remain together until her death in 2011. He and Lynda remained friendly.
Around this time, Lynda met the third love of her life—a doctor of Lebanese extract with whom she worked. He was a neurologist and psychiatrist who had earned his MD at Yale. Lynda often said that he saved her life and deserved a “place of honor” in her story. He helped her through the most difficult period of her life. They had a long-term relationship, but marriage was never in the cards. They parted as friends. Lynda said she always made it her policy to remain on good terms with the men who had been in her life.
Lynda landed a job as an emergency room clerk at the County Medical Center, doing billings and insurance for adults as they got released. Her father had insisted that she take some business classes to have something upon which to fall back. She did not type very quickly, but she did very well with medical terminology. She got promoted to accounts receivable, but she preferred working with patients instead of just office paperwork. As she said, “My specialty was always talking.” She especially liked working with teens.
In 1977, Lynda decided to return to school at Grossmont La Mesa to earn her practical nursing license. She had very good teachers there, but she got placed badly for her clinic hours. Her charges include the developmentally disabled, and Lynda was scared. The Down Syndrome patients could go out to work all day, but they could not do laundry or other basics at home. Lynda liked to be able to help, but dinners were some of the worst times, with food going everywhere. Leah was amazed she stuck it out.
In March of 1978, Lynda’s mother died. One way that she dealt with the grief was by working on getting her parents’ house ready to rent. She sold everything in the house except for a big console TV and a bed. Then she had the whole house painted inside and out. She rented it to three male college students. They were good tenants who never complained and fixed anything that needed fixing. They stayed there for the next four years, and then Lynda sold the house to the father of one of the tenants.
1980 was an eventful year. Vandy graduated high school, and Lynda earned both her nursing licenses (practical and vocational). She passed the vocational nursing test easily because of her experience, but she had little work experience in practical nursing (she said, “I didn’t even know which way the pillow goes.”) so that licensing test was much harder to pass. After receiving her license, Lynda took a job booking surgeries at the Tri-City Medical Center, a small hospital in Oceanside. She described the job as “horrendous.” But she did earn her certification to add IV and draw blood to her resume, which would later count toward a vocational nursing license. She went back to on-call emergency room work, including a stint in Compton. While interviewing for one job, she told the interviewer that what she did best was talk to people. The interviewer suggested she pursue a psychiatric technician credential. It seemed like a logical choice.
Knowing that the State board would require clinic hours, she hired on at Downtown Detox, in Chula Vista. Lynda said that she did not think many of the patients were serious about getting well, but rather, they “came in for the soup.” She liked Downtown Detox better than some of the places she was assigned when on-call for the county. Lynda often did not feel safe. One had very small rooms that felt particularly claustrophobic when a large person was brought in in restraints. At another place, there were snacks left out, and sometimes there was a cake. But the attendants would leave a big knife on the table for the cake. Not safe.
Over Easter while working at Downtown Detox, Lynda got sick again—this time with hepatitis—and was in the hospital. She was not going to make the same mistake as in 1970 and not finish her program. She did not tell them she was sick because they would have dropped her. A friendly nurse at the detox center signed off on her hours.
In 1983, Lynda bought the house at 2922 Panorama Crest in Escondido. It was a brand-new 2300-square-foot house in the Homeland Acres subdivision that had been designed and build by a single woman artist. There were three bedrooms and 2 baths on just under an acre of land on a hilltop. It had a beautiful view that overlooked avocado orchards. The area was still developing, and the street was like a country lane. They sometimes had to stop the car to wait for pigs or sheep to cross the road. There was enough land for Vandy’s dog—a large Sheltie-Shepherd mix—to run around. Lynda was very happy there.
Lynda passed her psych tech boards in 1984, but she did not pass the first time. She missed the cut-off by 3 points. The man she was with at the time said she would give up if she did not pass. That got her Irish up, and she passed on the third try. Vandy told her, “Mom, you just want all those letters after your name.” With her psych tech credential, Lynda started work at Villa View, a small, high-end San Diego hospital. She worked in the Substance Abuse unit and specialized in teenage patients.
During that time, Lynda was also learning cosmetology. She had always mixed her own hair coloring and saw cosmetics as another form of art. She took classes at the John Robert Powers School to learn to become a make-up artist. She kept up two resumes—one for nursing and the other for make-up. Her doctor friend said, “You always had seven irons in the fire and it looks like chaos, but it comes together like a symphony.”
Lynda had many gentlemen friends. She said she liked Irishmen, but she did not trust them. Too much Blarney. Vandy used to say, “She went out with a lot of men with good credentials.” She never remarried, though. She had very high standards for integrity, intelligence, and creativity, that had been set by her father and ex-husband.
For a while in the mid-1980s, Lynda worked for Nutrisystem, a commercial provider of weight loss products and services, back before it became an online business. There was an outlet in Escondido where she served as the onsite nurse, doing weigh-ins and diet counseling. It was a good job, but, because she had always wanted to travel, she decided to quit and travel to Europe. The daughters went with her. She visited Ireland and kissed the Blarney Stone, went to Paris, and stayed in Florence, admiring the artwork and linen crafts. Lynda also took an adventuresome, 3-day cruise from Turkey to Greece without the girls. The Greek airport got hit by terrorists, another ship hit at sea, and the taxis went on strike. She was trapped in Greece because she could not make the plane. She found locals to drive her to the airport the next day and was able to catch a plane that had been delayed late out of LA and had room because other passengers had made alternative arrangements.
Lynda became a grandmother for the first time in 1990 with the birth of Leah’s son Austin. He was born in New Jersey. Leah would have four more children over the next decade. Lynda has not gotten to see them enough, because they are all the way across the country. But in 1993, Vandy gave birth in Escondido. Rhett Felkins has been very close to his grandmother. Even after the Felkins moved out of state, Lynda often received letters, cards, and drawings from Rhett. She talks about him all the time and is very proud.
Around the time Rhett was born, Lynda decided to downsize. She sold the house she loved and bought a model mobile home. She parked it at 1530 E El Norte Pkwy #54 in Escondido. She liked her neighbors, but it did not work out as well as she hoped. The homeowners’ association did not do upkeep the way the condo association had, and maintaining the property was difficult. After a few years, she decided to sell, but, unlike when she sold her house and her condo, she took a bath financially.
Lynda then moved into a 52-unit apartment building on East Grand Avenue. There were 55 neighbors, including a roommate who was another psych nurse and who had a cat. Some of the neighbors worked and others did not, so Lynda could be as sociable as she desired. There were monthly dinners for the whole group. She met interesting people, including a journalist and a fairly successful painter who was very down-to-earth. There was more of a community. At the dinners, all the women ever seemed to talk about was their divorces and their dead husbands, so Lynda sat with the men after a while.
Between alimony and the house sale, Lynda did not really need to work, but she liked to be active. She got a job at Macy’s and then Mervyn’s (mostly for the discounts, she said). She was a salesperson in the jewelry section. It combined her two favorite things: art and talking to people. She also took an arts and crafts class lead by a teacher with MS, where she made beaded bracelets. She particularly liked the mixing of colors, as she did with make-up and hair-dye.
Lynda had always had health issues. On top of upper and lower back injuries, in 2006, she began to have a series of TIAs (mini-strokes). She moved out of the apartment and into a shared-living facility in Oceanside. There she met a young poet named Tyrone, the godson of one of the care-givers there. He always brightened her days and became like a son to her. After five years there, Lynda’s kidneys began to fail, and she had to begin dialysis. She gave up her room at the shared living home and move into Palomar Vista Healthcare Center. Tyrone continues to visit her.
The staff at Palomar Vista take very good care of Lynda, and she is very grateful for them. Most days she sleeps late (because she takes dialysis in the evenings), has lunch, plays bingo or socializes in the afternoon, and watches television in the evening if she is not at dialysis. She is particularly fond of the British show Doc Martin. Recently, she was elected Vice President of the Resident Council. (She missed a meeting and they elected her.) When she asked what that entailed, the woman in charge of activities told her, “Just talk to all the residents.” Right up her alley! As a perk for her excellent work, the administrators have set up a system where one of them will call a Lyft and accompany her out to meals or to K-Mart, so she can get out of the facility for something other than dialysis.
Lynda passed her psych tech boards in 1984, but she did not pass the first time. She missed the cut-off by 3 points. The man she was with at the time said she would give up if she did not pass. That got her Irish up, and she passed on the third try. Vandy told her, “Mom, you just want all those letters after your name.” With her psych tech credential, Lynda started work at Villa View, a small, high-end San Diego hospital. She worked in the Substance Abuse unit and specialized in teenage patients.
During that time, Lynda was also learning cosmetology. She had always mixed her own hair coloring and saw cosmetics as another form of art. She took classes at the John Robert Powers School to learn to become a make-up artist. She kept up two resumes—one for nursing and the other for make-up. Her doctor friend said, “You always had seven irons in the fire and it looks like chaos, but it comes together like a symphony.”
Lynda had many gentlemen friends. She said she liked Irishmen, but she did not trust them. Too much Blarney. Vandy used to say, “She went out with a lot of men with good credentials.” She never remarried, though. She had very high standards for integrity, intelligence, and creativity, that had been set by her father and ex-husband.
For a while in the mid-1980s, Lynda worked for Nutrisystem, a commercial provider of weight loss products and services, back before it became an online business. There was an outlet in Escondido where she served as the onsite nurse, doing weigh-ins and diet counseling. It was a good job, but, because she had always wanted to travel, she decided to quit and travel to Europe. The daughters went with her. She visited Ireland and kissed the Blarney Stone, went to Paris, and stayed in Florence, admiring the artwork and linen crafts. Lynda also took an adventuresome, 3-day cruise from Turkey to Greece without the girls. The Greek airport got hit by terrorists, another ship hit at sea, and the taxis went on strike. She was trapped in Greece because she could not make the plane. She found locals to drive her to the airport the next day and was able to catch a plane that had been delayed late out of LA and had room because other passengers had made alternative arrangements.
Lynda became a grandmother for the first time in 1990 with the birth of Leah’s son Austin. He was born in New Jersey. Leah would have four more children over the next decade. Lynda has not gotten to see them enough, because they are all the way across the country. But in 1993, Vandy gave birth in Escondido. Rhett Felkins has been very close to his grandmother. Even after the Felkins moved out of state, Lynda often received letters, cards, and drawings from Rhett. She talks about him all the time and is very proud.
Around the time Rhett was born, Lynda decided to downsize. She sold the house she loved and bought a model mobile home. She parked it at 1530 E El Norte Pkwy #54 in Escondido. She liked her neighbors, but it did not work out as well as she hoped. The homeowners’ association did not do upkeep the way the condo association had, and maintaining the property was difficult. After a few years, she decided to sell, but, unlike when she sold her house and her condo, she took a bath financially.
Lynda then moved into a 52-unit apartment building on East Grand Avenue. There were 55 neighbors, including a roommate who was another psych nurse and who had a cat. Some of the neighbors worked and others did not, so Lynda could be as sociable as she desired. There were monthly dinners for the whole group. She met interesting people, including a journalist and a fairly successful painter who was very down-to-earth. There was more of a community. At the dinners, all the women ever seemed to talk about was their divorces and their dead husbands, so Lynda sat with the men after a while.
Between alimony and the house sale, Lynda did not really need to work, but she liked to be active. She got a job at Macy’s and then Mervyn’s (mostly for the discounts, she said). She was a salesperson in the jewelry section. It combined her two favorite things: art and talking to people. She also took an arts and crafts class lead by a teacher with MS, where she made beaded bracelets. She particularly liked the mixing of colors, as she did with make-up and hair-dye.
Lynda had always had health issues. On top of upper and lower back injuries, in 2006, she began to have a series of TIAs (mini-strokes). She moved out of the apartment and into a shared-living facility in Oceanside. There she met a young poet named Tyrone, the godson of one of the care-givers there. He always brightened her days and became like a son to her. After five years there, Lynda’s kidneys began to fail, and she had to begin dialysis. She gave up her room at the shared living home and move into Palomar Vista Healthcare Center. Tyrone continues to visit her.
The staff at Palomar Vista take very good care of Lynda, and she is very grateful for them. Most days she sleeps late (because she takes dialysis in the evenings), has lunch, plays bingo or socializes in the afternoon, and watches television in the evening if she is not at dialysis. She is particularly fond of the British show Doc Martin. Recently, she was elected Vice President of the Resident Council. (She missed a meeting and they elected her.) When she asked what that entailed, the woman in charge of activities told her, “Just talk to all the residents.” Right up her alley! As a perk for her excellent work, the administrators have set up a system where one of them will call a Lyft and accompany her out to meals or to K-Mart, so she can get out of the facility for something other than dialysis.
Vandy, who had remarried and moved to the East Coast, has come to visit a couple of times and has brought Jack with her. She has also had a chance to reconnect with her daughter Leah. When she talks to Kevin (every few weeks), she is full of news about her daughters and grandchildren.
Lynda continues to be upbeat and curious about life. She reaches out to those around her to listen to their problems and lend a different perspective. She even talked to Kevin’s ex-wife Kelly to help her think about future shared living situations. Kelly was extremely appreciative. Lynda’s positive attitude uplifts all those with whom she comes into contact.
Lynda continues to be upbeat and curious about life. She reaches out to those around her to listen to their problems and lend a different perspective. She even talked to Kevin’s ex-wife Kelly to help her think about future shared living situations. Kelly was extremely appreciative. Lynda’s positive attitude uplifts all those with whom she comes into contact.