Tf -0
Hilda
c
1 :
Story by
Martha Stoddard
Photos by
Dan Dulaney
7
. '
t's not the typical rags-to-riches story.
In fact, by most standards, Linda Light
Strasheim's life has been just the opposite.
As a high school senior in 1962, she
walked off with the Miss Kansas crown and
a chance to compete in the Miss Universe
pageant. Never mind that she didn't win.
For Linda, just being chosen among the
most beautiful women in the world was
enough.
Soon she started a career as an airline
stewardess for TWA. For a year and a half,
while based in Kansas City, she criss-crossed
the country Los Angeles, New York,
Boston, San Francisco, Chicago. By day she
served passengers, but she spent the nights
dancing in one new city after another.
That's when the first symptoms hit: the
moments she almost lost her balance, the
weekends when all she could do was sleep,
the time a strawberry chiffon pie slipped out
of unsteady hands onto a passenger's lap.
Before a diagnosis was made, Linda had
lost her job, her husband and her freedom.
Finally her symptoms were given a name
multiple sclerosis, an incurable disease
that progressively attacks the nerve
endings. Today her legs won't carry her the
length of her Lincoln home. She has to
guard her strength to make it through each
day.
Yet Linda said she couldn't have life any
better.
Her faith in God, she said, and her
determination have made her life richer now
than ever before.
i
V
v.
-:.L
V
2! ! - : -
"::A.
1
fi
IV.
si
The SowerPage 2