Tanya Marsh

Freshman Lindy Patrick was so excited to get home for spring break, she left school early. But before Patrick reached her family, a car accident claimed her life.

Patrick, 19, was just a half mile from her home in Vivian when she rolled her car and died Thursday, March 3, at around 1 a.m.

Lindy’s mother, Lesa Patrick, said though the cause of the accident is unknown, it appears that Patrick drifted across the road then overcorrected, ending up in the ditch.

A nearby farmer called Patrick’s parents, who arrived at the scene before the ambulance.

Lesa Patrick said, “When we got there, we couldn’t open the door. Her dad reached in and tried to feel a pulse. She was still warm but he couldn’t feel a pulse.”

After the Jaws of Life freed Patrick’s body from the vehicle, it was determined she had probably died on impact.

Life without Patrick won’t be easy, her friends and family agree.

“It probably won’t hit me until some Friday afternoon when I’m waiting for her to walk in the door,” Lesa Patrick said. “I just can’t imagine never getting to see her again, never getting to talk to her again.”

Lesa Patrick said since Patrick was especially close with her 15-year-old brother Logan, her death will be hard for him.

“We’re very worried about her brother,” she said. “We sat down together and just said ‘We have to talk and make sure we’re in this together.’ “

Patrick’s roommate, freshman Randi Ozanne, is also struggling with her friend’s death.

“We’ve known each other since sixth grade – pretty much our whole lives,” said Ozanne, who is from Kennebec.

She said when a friend called her with the news of Lindy’s death, her first reaction was “What am I going to do without my best friend?”

Ozanne said she has moved from the room she shared with Patrick in Waneta into one in Young, but rather than stay in the residence hall alone, she has been driving back and forth from a relative’s in Sioux Falls.

Patrick, a general education student, took an interest in photography, music and movies, but truly valued relationships.

“Her friends and family were the core of her life,” Lesa Patrick said. “The hard part is to think she was so close to home, trying to get to us. It just seems so unfair that you can get that close and not make it.”

The family chose to run the poem “If I Knew,” author unknown, on the program at Patrick’s funeral, held Monday, March 7. The poem expressed how if we realized how limited time was, we’d cherish every day and make more of an effort to show our love.

However, Lesa Patrick doesn’t have regrets in that area.

“I never left her or hung up from her without telling her I loved her. It’s just so important that she knew she was loved.”

#1.885245:2024673351.jpg:Lindy Patrick.jpg:Lindy Patrick was a 19-year-old freshman at SDSU considering :