And somehow they all became family...

From a 2003 interview with my Titi, Betsy Rivera:

"The best thing was the number of different people that would come through those doors, and somehow they all became family, and I think you can remember that. There were people who would come and hang out for the entire Saturday with us, and help us sell and help us do this, and help us stock and whatever we needed to do and then there were people who would come every week just as regular customers.

"The old man, yeah we used to call him abuelo, he was a very effective business partner for Lela because he would go and whenever Lela would have to do the blessings with the pigeons he would go to the vivero, where they would kill the chickens and the pigeons and the pigs and stuff, he’d go the the vivero and bring back a fresh white pigeon for her to do her blessings with.

"So he would hang out with us and spend the day --he was a dancer and he’d go to the social club, the senior citizen club, he’d go there and hang out and then on his way home-- he would stop and see us and anything that Mom needed he would go and buy, like the pigeons…he passed away.

"Always dressed to the nines. That was very PR. My grandfather was always dressed, you know how it is in Puerto Rico everyone has to be dressed, but that had to be one of the toques, the touches, that reminded me so much of PR was that old man, but he was fun, we’d talk for hours, just filling the void."