NOUN always noticed my great-aunt was different from other women that were around her age. She has proudly said multiple times that she ADVERB VERB and does not pretends do so. She has different ideas about religion, and she doesn’t cook. She is more different than everyone in our family. What I didn’t realize was that she has always been like this for her whole life. Today on the anniversary of: “El Grito de Lares” she told me about her journey of being an independence supporter. She told me it all started back when she was a college student where they told her the whole history of Puerto Rico and she realized that we were a colony. “Back then the government tracked whoever was an independentist making what is known as “carpetas”, which were files that had information of you”, she told me.
My aunt NOUN never believed she was on a “carpeta”, but she does remember that one time she was stopped by the police because she had a Puerto Rican flag, which was illegal at the time. It was after she attended a celebration in Lares that she was walking in the plaza. The policeman demanded her flag and she responded with: “You can have it because I have more of them at home”. With that, the police snatched the flag from her hands angrily and left. She was very ADJECTIVE of what she came up with. Back then she had hope that Puerto Rico was going to be independent, but it never happened. The party she supported did not make the promises she had hoped they gave. She VERB all hope in the future of this island.
Afterwards she became a teacher but because of a surgery in her lungs, she lost her voice. She had to VERB her job because of this, but she continued to VERB others. This did not stop NOUN life completely. She had a depression for a while but managed to overcome it. She told me she watched all the photos with her students because a therapist told her that this would bring her relief and it did. She prayed everyday with hope that she would recover. Slowly she started to have her voice back, stuttering and mockery by the people of Morovis aside, she continued being ADJECTIVE through it all.
One day she woke up and her voice was back completely. Flores told my great-grandmother this and they celebrated. All the family was happy about this miracle. On this day she celebrates the anniversary of “El Grito de Lares” with a bottle of in one hand and a cup in the other, she feels proud about how she handled life. She told me: “Los hombres pasan, pero los principios se quedan y triunfan”. Because even if she lost her voice, she stayed being herself for the rest of her life and persevered.
