Linda Feger

Lay Your Burden Down Some of the words from an old Negro spiritual go like this: Lay your burden down, lay your burden down Take your troubled soul, your tired mind And lay your burden down Lay your burden down, get your feet on solid ground Lay your burden down, lay your burden down Take your weary life, your heavy load, and lay your burden down Lay your burden down, get your feet on solid ground You've been tryin' hard to make it all alone Tryin' hard to make it on your own And the strength you once were feelin', isn't there no more And you think the wrong you've done, is just too much to be forgiven We cannot know for Linda the true nature of her burden. We cannot know the thoughts that led her to believe she could not lay her burden down. Many loved her and were concerned with her struggle and tried to share her load. For reasons known only to Linda she could not. We often hear of the tremendous strength and resiliency of the human spirit. And it is true. Against all odds, many can rise to meet and even exceed the challenges they face. What we sometimes do not hear or see, or close our ears and eyes to, is that life can be fragile, hanging in a delicate balance between hope and despair. Sometimes, when we are hanging by a thread, the thread frays and breaks. Rest peacefully, dear Linda. Rest in the peace this life would not afford. Gene Braaksma

My condolences to Linda's family. This is quite a shock, to say the least. I'll miss stopping by her office and kidding her or sharing a joke with her. She was a very soft-hearted, caring person. We'll really miss her!

To Linda's family, I send my deepest condolences. Linda had a sense of humor like few others. She was open, sincere, and genuine. She always had a presence about her that made the nature of working in a maximum security prison a little more hopeful and less dreary. She brought comfort to collegues and hope to those offenders with little else.

To Linda's family--My deepest sympathy on the loss of your sweet Linda. I have been working with her for the past two years and I considered her a friend. I will miss her fun, caring, and generous nature. She was a compassionate person who truly wanted to help people, and I am glad I had the opportunity to know her.

My sincerest sympathies to Linda's family. I had the privilege of working with her for 15 years and always appreciated her humor, humanity, and competence, a 'bride married to amazement' as this poem goes: When death comes like the hungry bear in autumn; when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse to buy me, and snaps the purse shut; when death comes like the measle-pox when death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades, I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering: what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness? And therefore I look upon everything as a brotherhood and a sisterhood, and I look upon time as no more than an idea, and I consider eternity as another possibility, and I think of each life as a flower, as common as a field daisy, and as singular, and each name a comfortable music in the mouth, tending, as all music does, toward silence, and each body a lion of courage, and something precious to the earth. When it's over, I want to say all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. When it's over, I don't want to wonder if I have made of my life something particular, and real. I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened, or full of argument. I don't want to end up simply having visited this world - Mary Oliver