Linda Griffiths: If she could do it, she had to do it — and would do it

An artist, photographer, model, actress and jewelry designer, Griffiths didn't let much get in the way of her passion for life — not a tumultuous childhood, not a charging bull and not the bile-duct cancer that claimed her life Jan. 29, less than a month before her 65th birthday.

"I knew that her cancer was terminal, but I never remembered that when I talked to her," said her half-brother, Steve Moore, of Indiana, about their long and humor-filled telephone conversations.

"One thing a lot of people always remember about her, she had such wonderful laugh. I think of that laugh every single day. It was long and it was kind of a robust type of laugh. It wouldn't take much to get her laughing."

Growing up, Griffiths didn't have a lot to laugh about, but she made the best of every situation.

She was born in Louisville, Ky., to Henry Moore and Rosamae Savage and inherited many of her mother's best traits, said Griffiths' daughter, Julie Esslinger of California.

"My grandmother was very poetic with her words. She liked to rhyme and she was very quick-witted and funny and a very outgoing personality. A very beautiful woman," Esslinger said. "When I was younger my mother and my grandmother sewed most of my clothes."

Her parents divorced, and Griffiths, who pored over Wonder Woman comics as a girl and idolized the superhero, later went to live with her father and his new wife in Indiana. The relationship with her father and stepmother was strained, but Griffiths doted on her three half-siblings, Rita, Steve and Joe.

"She was almost a teenager when we were born," said Steve Moore. "She hovered over us quite a bit.

"She would follow us up the street when we were little," Moore said. "She would always pull us in the wagon down to the schoolyard so we could play. The other direction was a Dairy Queen, and she used to take us there quite a bit."

Decades later, Griffiths told Moore: "I loved you kids like you were my own. You kids were my babies."

Griffiths raised her own children to be independent and creative.

"She wasn't the kind of mom who tried to restrain us," Esslinger said. "She wanted us to explore our imaginations and our creative sides."

Esslinger's younger brother, Sean Chamness, remembers their mother as an easygoing free spirit. "If we asked, she'd pretty much let us do what we wanted as long as it was safe," Chamness said. "She was definitely interesting, that's for sure. Never a dull moment."

Esslinger remembers her mother exercising her creativity whenever she could.

She performed in community theater when they lived in Santa Barbara, Calif. And one year Griffiths was featured in the newspaper when she won a Easter bonnet design contest. Her chapeau was replete with spring flowers and topped with a large, chocolate bunny.

Chamness remembers his mother driving them from California to Arizona in an old rust bucket. "She bought this total piece of junk car. It was a couple hundred dollars she paid for it, and the floor pans were all rusted out," he said. "I don't know how we made it to Arizona."

Said Esslinger: "My brother and I were riding in the back of the car and you could see the road through the floor. My mom said, 'Don't stick your feet out the holes. You'll get road rash.' "

The sense of adventure and confidence Griffiths instilled in her children created a strong family bond.

"I never felt like I had to hide anything from her growing up," Chamness said. "We had very candid conversations about anything you could possibly imagine, and nothing was held back. It was good for laughs.

"I called her once a week — we'd sit on the phone and I would talk to her for an hour, an hour and a half, and we would talk about everything, I mean everything, and laugh, laugh, laugh, laugh. That's the thing I'm going to miss most. She had a great sense of humor — silly, sarcastic, witty."

Griffiths' sense of whimsy didn't wane after her children were grown. Longtime friend Sandy Farris recalled an outing the women took that ended with a running of the bulls.

"We were down in the back country, down by Patagonia. We were going to do an article on the old ghost towns there," she said.

As the women drove by a field, Griffiths saw a herd of cows lying beneath a tree. As sunlight filtered through the branches, it fell on a calf in the middle of the group. Deciding the serene moment must be photographed, Griffiths got out of the car and approached the herd.

"I said, 'Linda, be careful for the bulls. They're really mean.'

"She said, 'Which ones are the bulls?'

"And I said, 'The ones with the horns.'

"She said, 'They all have horns,' " Farris said.

"All of the sudden those animals stood up, and I'd never seen an animal that big move so fast. I'm yelling, 'Linda, get in the car! Get in the car!' but she got the picture. Then she was running like the dickens to get in the car.

"We've been through a lot of things together. Some silly things and funny things and serious things as well. She was unique," Farris said.

Griffiths had a natural eye for color and composition, but it was Steve Griffiths, her partner of 28 years — and husband of 19 years — who provided her with the technical knowledge she needed to be a photographer.

"They had a creative life together," Esslinger said. "He would play a wooden flute while my mom painted."

The couple met when they both lived in the same Tucson apartment complex and Linda asked him on a date. Steve was a professional sports photographer and found Linda beautiful, creative and spiritual.

"She liked to investigate and explore, get out, go up the mountains and see what she can find," Steve Griffiths said. "She was always willing to go wherever I wanted to go. Whether it was in a mine pit or up a mountain, she was always ready to go."

Linda Griffiths' life was guided by her can-do, must-do, will-do spirit.

"She always tried to do her best," Esslinger said. "Do good things and good things will happen to you. She definitely lived her life that way. She really believed in overcoming any obstacle."

It was a belief that allowed Griffiths to exceed her doctor's expectations.

"She had a prognosis of six months, and she lived two years," Esslinger said. "She mentally and physically willed herself to live longer than they told her she would live. That's how my mom did things. She did it her way — and we all loved her for it."

On StarNet: Did you know Linda Griffiths? Share your memories of her at azstarnet.com/lifestories and find a photo gallery at azstarnet.com/slideshows

the series

This feature chronicles the lives of recently deceased Tucsonans. Some were well-known across the community. Others had an impact on a smaller sphere of friends, family and acquaintances. Many of these people led interesting — and sometimes extraordinary — lives with little or no fanfare. Now you'll hear their stories.