Veracruz is not the same, anymore, without you sitting on your bench.
I first met Brigeth about a year ago when as an American, I was in Veracruz giving a set of security lectures at the University for students and Corporations. I would fly down to Veracruz from New Orleans periodically as a security consultant. One of my Mexican friends told me on one of these visits that I could not claim to know Veracruz if I did not know Brigeth. I thought, "this is strange, who is this 'Brigeth'?" My friend took me down to the corner of Costa Verde and Juan Pablo 2 to show me who this was and in the distance I could see this bright shining young woman sitting on this what seemed to me rotten skinny purple bench with a flimsy roof covering. My friend pulls over to the corner (there is a bustop there) next to the bench and calls over this uber frendly young woman. If you had ever physically seen Brigeth, there are no words to describe her. She was built for attention, enough said. But as I sat in the driver's side and watched this beautiful woman approach on the request of my friend, I realized there was more to her than that. She was a shining light of charisma. Her feminine voice, her bright smile (complete with braces) and friendly manner blew your senses away. When you talked to Brigeth, she made you feel like you were the only one on earth worth listening to.
I went back to Veracruz last week and drove by her bench and it was as if the world had ended. There was no one there. The bench was empty.
It's hard to explain the profound sense of loss I felt. She was gone now, forever. She didn't just take a little bit of Veracruz with her. She took all of it, the optimism, the future, the knowledge that no matter how bad your environment was (like that bench she sat on everyday) you could still make it what you wanted, a lovely place to sit down.
Brigeth, I miss you dearly.
