Wednesday, November 24, 2021
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A Eulogy of Life
Written by Family Friend: Brad Taggart
Linda Ellen Kyle was a beautiful soul with a real zest for life. Ever since she was young, she enjoyed socializing. She loved good conversation, good laughs, being surrounded by those who loved her and those she loved back. She was born in Morgantown, graduated high school, raised her family and eventually passed away here.
In 1963, at 19 years old, she traveled to Texas to marry her best friend and high school sweetheart Bill, who had joined the army and was now Private 1st class William St. Clair Kyle III. After his station in Texas, they headed overseas to be stationed in Germany. In 1965, her first child, Tracy, was born. Months later when Bill’s tour of duty ended, they moved back to Morgantown to be close to both of their families, and to raise their own. Linda had two sisters, Betty Lee and Barbara Jean. Tracy’s little brother Mark came along a couple years later, and that completed their family. The kids spent a lot of time with their grandparents, since both parents worked, but they also had aunts, uncles and cousins too as they grew up.
Changes came in 1998 when the plant Bill worked at closed. Linda and Bill both enjoyed the beach, and for Bill, the job opportunities were more plentiful, they moved to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
In 2002, As the old expression so well points out, “You can take the man out of the mountains, but you can’t take the mountains out of the man.” Bill was restless at the beach, and so they decided to move back to their mountains in West Virginia and settled down just up the road in Bruceton Mills. Sadly, after 43 years of marriage, her husband and best friend Bill passed away at the end of the same year on December 4th.
After years of mourning and missing Bill, she found the strength to try and move on. A new relationship blossomed with Allison Liston and they spent more than a dozen years together. As those years were rolling out, her arthritis was slowly getting worse, and it was keeping her off of the dance floor more than she would have liked. She loved to dance.
Once Tracy and her children moved back home to West Virginia in 2014, Linda had all of her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren, all right there around her. The last few years had even found her making a pilgrimage to Myrtle Beach each winter with her daughter Tracy. It was something she always looked forward to, as she called the beach her ‘happy place’. She was also the proud Queen of the local chapter of The Red Hat Ladies Club in Bruceton Mills, West Virginia.
The middle of Fall 2021, both Linda and Allison laid victims of the COVID-19 virus, Linda’s body just wasn’t strong enough to fight it by itself, and she succumbed to pneumonia on the 20th of October. Allison was able to get through and was just luckier than her to have survived it.
At 76, Linda passed away and just the same way as this adventure started, she knew how much she was loved, and they knew how much she loved them, which meant everything to her. Finding her peace in heaven she found the most beautiful dance floor she’d ever seen with Bill standing there waiting to ask for the first dance.
Linda Ellen Kyle 12/19/44 - 10/20/21
