Ana Maria Montero

This is not a notice at all actually. And it’s certainly not about death.

It’s the story of a devoted and intentional life. A reminder of the incredible fight that sits within all of us. And a celebration of a journey just begun.

This is a story about our mother, Ana Maria Montero. Born Ruiz de Molina in a small town called Holguin in Cuba in 1941. July 26th.

She was a beautiful young woman, there’s no denying that. And she led what we her children always gleaned to be an idyllic childhood in Cuba, along with her older brother Eladio and her white collar, and white linen dressed parents. The Tennis Club, L’Estonac, her elaborate quinceanera. From the painted photos and stories it seemed a majestic time in her life, but also a sheltered one.

As with many immigrant beginnings though, there was an eventual pivot. A first act turning point to her story. A political revolution that put communist Fidel Castro in power in Cuba. Her brother was already studying in the US, so she fled and joined him. In a new country. At 17. Away from her parents for the first time. In a not so little town called New Orleans.

She knew very few people and very little English. But she was fierce. And determined. She started classes at LSU. She got a job at a furniture store. She found roommates and a place to live. She had no money, but she was on her own. Some of the best years of her life.

And then one day she got into a trolley accident, another important turn in her story. She was hospitalized with a severe back injury. The hospital appointed a chaplain during her stay. His name was Father Montero of the Franciscan Cappuccinos. He was a priest at a nearby parish. They became fast friends.

She started to go to his church. She joined the choir, and the youth ministry. She met some lifelong friends. And as fate would have it, during an Autumn in the late 60s, she fell in love. With the chaplain at the hospital, with her best friend, with our father, and her priest.

Luckily, our father, another immigrant from Spain with a similarly complex backstory, was equally smitten. And so they somehow figured it out. A Cuban princess and a Franciscan priest with little more than $50 to their name. He received his papal dispensation and left the priesthood, and they both left New Orleans.

They got married in Birmingham Alabama where her brother Eladio settled down and still lives today with his wife Sarah. Eventually the young couple made their way to Georgia. Our father became a professor and she worked various side jobs. They made a very modest living.

And then we came along. All four of us that survive her today. The oldest son Jose, the only daughter Ana Maria, the third child Luis, and the youngest, Francisco. We became her entire life.

She poured her everything into her children and we are everything she taught us to be (or at least we hope we are) – respectful, determined, hard-working, grateful and luckily, close to each other. That was maybe her biggest gift, to keep us close. The importance of family was always paramount to her, and she never let us forget it.

Looking back, we’re not quite sure how she did it, but knowing her we’re also not at all surprised she did. Juggling four kids and part time jobs. Parent teacher conferences in broken English. Cutting coupons to make a modest income stretch just far enough. Church groups, sports, boy scouts, girl scouts. And of course, her beloved Cuban Club, where she served as secretary, and taught us all how to dance. All while fighting her chronic arthritis resulting in over 25 surgeries over 40 years.

She was a fighter like nobody we’ve ever met. She fought for us and showed us how to fight for ourselves. We called her the Leona. La matriarca. Because she had the strongest will of anyone we knew, and because she always got her way. Which usually meant that we, her children, got our way in the end. It didn’t always feel like that in the moment, but as you get older you realize that those fights we lost to her, she was actually winning for us.

Our father passed away 14 years ago of liver cancer, after 38 years of marriage leaving her a widow and alone for the first time since her early days in New Orleans. It was a complex marriage, as many are, but it was the love she knew. And moving on from that is not easy. But she did was she had always done, what fighters do. She did her hair, she put on her dress and heels, and she kept moving.

At 78, she moved from our family home of 40+ years into a townhouse all her own for a fresh start. She found the house online by herself, bought it with her own money and lived there happily for two years.

She forged a new path for herself, not as a widower but as her own woman, carving out a new identity outside of my father. And again, she kept moving.

She kept moving through two weddings and four grandkids – Ana Maria’s daughters Madelina and Isabela and Luis’ son Diego and daughter Lucia – who will always be inspired by Abuela’s strength of will.

She kept moving through her children’s multiple moves to Oregon, Colorado, Miami, Madrid, Atlanta.

Through her beloved four cats, one of which – Figaro - survives her today.

Through multiple heart and brain surgeries and more hospital stays than we care to count.

Even when the doctors gave her 48 hours to live this past January, she kept moving for another 3 months.

She was an unstoppable force. Always. It was one of the most impressive things about her.

Three days ago, we were all gathered around her bed for a wedding blessing for my oldest brother Jose and his fiancé Adriana who are soon to be married.

She had finally stopped moving like she used to. But make no mistake, behind that tired body and those closed eyes, she was anything but still.

You could feel her. Watching all of us and smiling. Another milestone reached. Another moment complete. Her soul was full. And it was time, to keep moving.

Our mother did not die. She lived.

Authored by Luis J. Montero

Atlanta, GA.