Linda Rebecca Stephenson Litton

By Carolyn Stephenson
August 25, 2019

Linda Rebecca Stephenson was born June 30, 1948 at Nichols Hospital in Spur, Texas. The earliest memory I have of Linda was Mom telling me that Linda was very small when she was born weighing maybe 3 or 4 pounds. It should say on her birth certificate. Linda made up for her tiny weight as she grew older. Although, I never knew how much she weighed, she was a little hefty as she became an adult as we all have. When Linda was small she started sleep walking; the only one of her siblings to do so. Mom would have to walk her back to bed and watch her carefully. Living at McAdoo Mom would hear the back door open in the night and get up to find Linda outside. We didn’t have much of a lock on our doors. It was just a block of wood with a nail driven through the middle of it to turn to one side or the other. We never had to worry about locking our doors back then.

Another time was when we were at the Old Settlers in Roaring Springs. Everybody who lived in the area knew about the Old Settlers. There was a rodeo, a Young Folks dance and an Old Folks dance and a carnival. We always went to the Old Settlers every year. Being just kids we liked to spend our time on the carnival grounds, while daddy spent most of his time on the dance floor. Mom didn’t dance. It must have been very boring for her and a little upsetting to see her husband dance with all those women. Although, he sure enjoyed himself. Many times Mom would walk around the carnival grounds with us making sure we all stayed together. Uncle Nath, who was Daddy’s older brother, played the fiddle along with his friends for the Old Folks Dance. Uncle Nath played for the Old Setters Dance for over 30 years. I believe it was the last week end of August starting on a Thursday and went through Saturday. We always went Friday and Saturday night because Daddy had to work. I remember when I was about 7 maybe 8, we were all in the car at the Old Settlers waiting on Daddy to come to the car. It was very late probably 12 or a little after. Sometimes the dance would go until 1:00 a.m. on a Saturday. Ma, Daddy’s mom, was in the car with us. Daddy had a good parking spot because we could see the dance floor and hear the music. Mom told Ma that she was going to look for Jenk and to keep the kids in the car. She was trying to gather us up because it was almost time for us to go home. Ma was holding either Henry or David while Mom left to find Jenk. I can’t remember which one Ma was holding. Linda had fallen asleep and decided to open the car door. Ma told Linda to close the door. Of course, Linda was sleep walking once again and did not get back in the car. She walked towards the dance area with Ma calling to her to come back. Ma couldn’t leave to get her because she was holding either Henry or David who was only just a few months old and she had the rest of us in the car. Mom came back to the car shortly after that with Jenk and Ma was very upset because Linda had gotten away from her. Mom and Jenk left to look for Linda. Linda was found down at the rodeo grounds but she was okay. Linda finally grew out of sleep walking.

When Jenk and Linda were very young living at Duncan Flat (before I was born), Mom had just done the wash and needed to hang the clothes up outside. She told Jenk to watch Linda and she would be back in shortly. Jenk wasn’t very old, maybe around 4 years old, and I’m sure he did not want to look after his sister. Linda started crying and wouldn’t stop so Jenk found some cocklebur leaves and fed them to Linda to keep her quiet. When Mom came back in, Linda was eating something. Mom asked Jenk “what is Linda eating”? and Jenk said “I gave her some leaves because, she wouldn’t stop crying”. Mom took her finger and got them all out of her mouth and didn’t think she had swallowed any. If you look up cocklebur leaves and berries you will find that pioneers used them for rheumatism, tuberculosis, constipation, sinusitis and many other ailments.

After we moved to Lubbock, I remember Linda punching a neighborhood kid down the street named Joey. We only had one little tricycle or scooter. I think I was in the second grade. I was outside riding the little red scooter and Joey walked up and took it away from me. I went inside the house probably crying and told what happened and Linda, doing what big sisters do, marched down the sidewalk to Joey’s front yard. She confronted Joey and demanded he hand over the scooter. Of course he didn’t, because Joey was a neighborhood bully. Linda didn’t hesitate not for one second. She pulled that fist of hers back and punched him right in the mouth and knocked him down. Linda always had a good left handed punch. She was wearing her purple ring and that helped quiet a bit. He got up bleeding, crying and went running back into his house. Linda picked up the scooter and gave it back to me and we went walking back to our house. Joey never took anything of ours again. Sometimes you just have to stand up to these bullies. I should have stood up to him, but I was always afraid and I was little. Linda never had a problem with standing up to people. If she thought she was being wronged, she would sure let them know about it.

Having 4 brothers made some fun times playing together. Linda never liked playing outside but she would at different times. We were all outside playing baseball with Barney and James (cousins) and Jenk I think. It was Linda’s turn to bat and she was left handed. She knew how to swing that bat for sure. I stepped back to the left waiting for her to swing, but I didn’t step back far enough. When she swung the bat backwards, I was hit on the side of my head right in the temple on my left side. Linda hit that ball and it was a homerun. I was doubled over in pain and had to go in the house because I had a terrible headache. Linda felt bad about it but it wasn’t her fault. We had many happy times growing up and I wouldn’t change it, not for a million dollars.

Linda and I didn’t always get along with each other. She liked being in the house and I didn’t. Mom had a hard time keeping me in the house because I loved being outside. Whatever the boys were doing, I was outside helping or playing basketball, baseball, or football or riding horses or right in the middle of whatever they were doing. Linda liked cooking and sewing and I could care less. Mom always had me to help in the kitchen, but I didn’t like it, not one bit. My job was setting the table and filling all the glasses up with ice and tea for each meal and we ate three meals a day. And we were a big family. There were a lot of dishes to wash afterwards and I hated washing dishes. Linda and I would argue over whose turn it was to wash or dry. Daddy would sometimes have to get his belt to get me in the kitchen to help Linda. I was one stubborn kid. Sometimes Linda and I would flip a coin to decide who would wash or dry. There were times I had to wash the dishes more often because Linda’s hands, like Mom, would break out into a rash because she was allergic to the dishwashing soap. You would think with her being my only sister, it would be easy to get along, but it wasn’t.

Another time, we were living in Swenson, Linda would complain I wouldn’t stay on my side of the bed. I was always taking up her side and taking all the covers. Well, you have to remember, we had no heat in that house. I had to stay warm and she was the warmest spot in the bed. Daddy got tired of all the complaining so he went out into the wilderness and chopped down a big branch from a tree and brought it into the house about bedtime. He threw that branch onto the bed to divide the bed in half and said, “now stay on your side”. I woke up the next morning with splinters all in my thighs. I don’t think we had anymore problems. That was Linda’s favorite story as an adult, when it came to the two of us arguing.

Linda was always afraid of horses. She didn’t like to ride, but we talked her into getting on Cody, our horse, just for a short time while we were living at Swenson. We had a tractor shed out back where Daddy always parked his tractor. Linda sat on Cody as long as he wasn’t moving. But Cody didn’t like standing out in the sun, so he took a notion to walk in under the tractor shed that had a low ceiling. We all yelled at Linda to duck her heard down to go in the tractor shed, but she was panicking and didn’t do it. She kept leaning backwards and the ceiling raked her off Cody’s back and she fell inside on the cement floor on her knees. She cried and never got on Cody again. She always had problems with that knee as an adult.

Linda recalled a story she told many times when she and I were having to stay with Aunt Edna on Ave. S in Lubbock for some reason. I don’t remember where everybody else was but Aunt Edna and Aunt Lou got into an argument. Aunt Lou got mad and threw a fork at Aunt Edna. The fork missed Aunt Edna but Linda had to dodge the fork. Linda never forgot that and would talk about it at different times.

Linda’s first job was working at Ralf and Hall Drugstore on the east loop in Lubbock Texas. There was a small snack bar inside Ralf and Hall Drugstore that sold fried chicken and gravy. It was there Linda learned how to make the best fried chicken. Linda would get to bring home any fried chicken left over and it was delicious and crunchy. When she cooked chicken at home she would use the same recipe as she did at work. It was nothing more than dipping chicken into a well beaten egg with milk then dipping it into flour and placing into a hot skillet. It sure was good, but fattening. I don’t remember how long she worked there, but her next job was working for JoAnn’s Fabrics on Avenue Q in Lubbock, next to Globe’s Department Store.

She sold fabric and would make small curtains for a display in the store. Linda loved to sew so whatever material went on sale Linda would buy. She would make pillows or aprons or curtains for our windows when we lived on Sumac road just outside the east city limits of Lubbock. It’s not called Sumac anymore; it has been renamed Redwood Avenue. Linda was very skillful at sewing, Her next job was working at a Hancock’s drapery warehouse on the North loop. I don’t think it is there anymore. She worked there a few years making drapes for office buildings. Working in the warehouse also caused her asthma to flare up at times. She had always had problems with her asthma but used her sprays the doctor gave her.

Linda was always on some kind of diet. She could never lose the weight she wanted. She decided she would try Weight Watchers. She would cook the food, but she would only eat a small amount of food according to the weight using a food scale. She stayed on it until she got down to 125 pounds and wow, she sure looked pretty. There is a picture of her in her red sweater after losing her weight on Jenk’s website.

We always did our grocery shopping at Piggly Wiggly on east Fourth Street. Mom had a favorite checker to check our groceries and his name was Craig Litton. He was always very nice and helpful. One day a man called asking for Linda and it was Craig. They went out on a date, but Mom was not happy about it, because Craig got her name and phone number off her check at the grocery store. Craig was not the first man Linda went out with. There was a man called Mike whom Linda met at work and brought him to the house. Mom didn’t like him because he was loud and drank and teased Mom about taking Linda out. Linda said he would drive very fast and would not slow down when she asked. Don’t know what happened with that relationship, but Linda didn’t go out with him anymore. Getting back to Craig, he dressed very nice; had very good manners, he smoked some and drank some, but later stopped. I remember he came over to the house and wanted to cook a meal for us. He was an excellent cook. Linda helped him in the kitchen and we all sat down to eat. Afterwards, Mom told him it was a very good meal. I can’t remember what he cooked but it was good. One day Craig asked Mom if she would giver her blessing to marry Linda and she would not. He asked why but Mom would not say. Linda had been attending Texas Technological College for 3 and ½ years majoring in Elementary Education, but quit to marry Craig who was also attending Tech majoring in Business. Linda paid for her own wedding at a church close to Acuff, just a few miles down the road on east Fourth Street. They lived in some apartment in Lubbock for a few years but finally moved to Longview, Texas. After moving to Longview, Linda’s asthma didn’t bother her much any more, but she had had asthma since she was a small child.

They lived in an apartment in Longview until they bought their house where Jason, their son, now lives. She bought the house for only $30,000 and it sits on about ¾ of an acre. Today, that house would be worth a lot more. Linda got a job at a fabric store making drapes for businesses around town. She did that for a few years until she had Jason and Julie and tried to keep them in daycare, but it was costing her more than what she was making. She decided to stay home until the kids got old enough to start Kindergarten. Linda got a job working at Walmart and Craig was a dispatcher for Halliburton Oil Company and finally transferred to Mobley Oil Company as a dispatcher.

She would tell me stories about customers and how demanding they could be, but Linda could always stand up for herself. She worked in the back of Walmart in the fabric department. She would measure out the amount the customers wanted. She enjoyed doing that but it was hard on her feet, because she had to stand all day. She was always looking forward to getting her breaks so she could sit down and rest her feet. Walmart was always hiring young people that didn’t like to work. Some of them did as little as possible. After a while it became a habit that Linda could not get anyone to relieve her while she took her break. She would call up front for someone to take her place for a short time and no one would show up so she complained to her boss. Her boss told her he would make sure someone would be there next time for her break. But no one came. Linda was having to work through her break without lunch and bathroom break. She finally had enough, so she made her a little cardboard sign that said “Gone on Break, Be Back in 30 minutes”. Customers complained that no one was at the fabric table to wait on them. The boss called Linda in and told her she couldn’t do that. Linda told him “I did and I will. It’s in her contract that she is allowed a 30 minute break. I don’t think she had anymore problems. She was later transferred to the pharmacy department. She enjoyed working up front for a change and she met a lady and the two became good friends. While she was stocking the pharmacy area she was asked to set up a display and she did. It looked really nice and she was proud of it. The next day she went into work and her display was gone. It made Linda mad because someone had taken her display. She looked all over that store and found her display box. She took it apart and left everything that was in the box on the floor. She took it back to the pharmacy and reset her display. The young girl who took it came back and yelled at Linda for taking her display. Linda told her it was hers and that’s where it was going to stay. They both got called in the office and the young girl quit.

Mom and I would always go to Longview every summer and spend a couple of weeks with Linda. We sure enjoyed those days. Linda and I became very close as we grew older. Linda would call everyday and talk to Mom but couldn’t talk long because it was long distance. Today, with cell phones, there are no more long distance charges. Sure would have been nice if we had them back then. After mom passed away, Linda would still call everyday and we would talk. Linda always regretted not having finished college and Craig as well. But she was happy with her family. We even talked about Aunt Lou’s passing on the 26 th of November, just a few days earlier. We both agreed it would be a sad Thanksgiving for Lynette, Ray and Maurice. The last time I talked to Linda was a Saturday night about 9:30 p.m. She had been sick and not feeling well. I told her she needed to go to the doctor. She said she would. Her asthma had been bothering her a bit. I told her good night and I always said I love you before I hung up. About 3:00 a.m. Julie called me and said Linda had died. She had been sleeping in the recliner because it was easier for her to breathe. Craig slept on the couch because of his back. Linda got up to go to the bathroom and Craig told her to go to bed. Craig heard a loud crash and he called out to Linda but she didn’t answer. He got up and found her on the floor. He called 911 and Linda said I can’t breathe. He did CPR, but it didn’t work. Ambulance came after 20 minutes and worked on her for an hour at the hospital but she was gone. Craig missed her very much for years, until he passed away of cancer in 2016.

She passed away early Sunday morning November 30, 2003. She was only 55 years old. My one and only sister was gone, but my memories of her will always be with me.