My grandmother, Brigida Adamas Rosas de Quintero, with Mom and Uncle Lucho. In mid-1930s Panama City, República de Panamá. The family lived for awhile on Avenida Central.
Brigida was a matriarch, a strong-willed woman from Tolé – in Panama’s highland province of Chiriquí (i.e., the boonies). She was from a poor peasant family. Her biological father, a farmer, died from a snakebite when she was a child. Her mother remarried and Brigida never got over a hatred of snakes (she also lost one of her brothers to a snakebite).
One day, a man rode by their homestead on a beautiful white horse. He was an engineer on his way to a nearby road construction worksite. He would ride by her home daily during the project. She was in awe of the beauty of the steed and would stand by the trail every day to get a glimpse of them, eventually leading to romance with its rider. When the construction project was completed, Papa asked to meet Brigida’s family and proposed marriage. She was 16.
I’m grateful for the great stories from my grandparents that live deep in my heart.