Longtime friends are one of life’s special blessings, and their passing leaves one feeling not only grief-stricken, bewildered and helpless but wanting to reminisce and somehow keep them in our lives.
My friend Libby Zink recently passed away after a short illness. I met Libby and her husband Leonard 35 years ago when I moved to La Jolla. It was her love of flowers and gardening that brought us together. After admiring each other’s gardens she said that I had a green thumb up to my elbow. I replied that she could be “Mrs. Jolly Green Giant” because even a dried-up stick would soon be in full bloom under her determined, gentle care.
Her love of flowers started in high school. Little did she know that this passion would influence so much of her life. Libby was a regular at all the flower shows in San Diego and she took prize-winning photos of her favorite subject.
Libby had another passion in life, one that started in 1926 when she was just 6 years old. She loved her hometown of Boston but always looked forward to Sunday afternoon visits to her uncle’s country home, where she could play with the turtles that lived in his pond.
I suppose all Bostonians are patriotic, but some put it into action. In 1942, Libby enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard. That choice was probably motivated by her grandfather, a Bostonian sea captain whose ship regularly sailed from Boston to Nicaragua.
Libby came out to California one November, and, after seeing so many flowers blooming in winter, she returned home, sold her house and moved to San Diego. She was so impressed by the colorful flowers that grew along our freeways that she decided to work with the Division of Highways. It was there that she was naturally attracted to the supervisor of landscape and horticulture, Leonard Zink. They were married a year later.
Leonard had built a home in Pacific Beach, and the acre lot left plenty of room for Libby to develop her two main passions. Flowers, vegetables and a few fruit trees took over all but 1,000 square feet. That area was specifically built for turtles. This electrically heated turtle pond was divided between box turtles and water turtles. As the saying goes, “If you build it, they will come.” And soon this home for injured and unwanted turtles was filled to capacity, though if necessary Libby would always find room for one more.
For years she was a member of the San Diego Turtle Society. They passed many homeless and injured turtles on to her, some needing medical attention. After proper veterinary care, they would come home to Libby’s turtle infirmary. Fish tanks on shelves lined the walls of one of the bedrooms. Each tank was fitted with a heating pad to keep the turtles’ temperatures up during convalescence. Leonard always said that “she was crazy over turtles all of her life.”
Libby was as unassuming and tranquil as her turtles. At her request before she died on Feb. 13, all 30 of her turtles were placed in good homes. Last week a plaque of Libby and Leonard (who was a Marine in World War II) was added to the Mount Soledad Veterans Memorial in La Jolla.