My Grandma Amada was a towering 5’1. Ever the matriarch of our Latino family, she demanded respect. In return, she dished out old fashioned love. I sometimes joke that my ears are so big because she pulled them so much when I was a kid. But boy did she love me. Even in one of her final days she mustered enough strength to get out of her hospice bed and watch me on CNN. She was so proud. And fierce. She was exceptional. She was 104. Remarkable to think how many times her heart beat over that lifespan. She lived through not one, but two global pandemics, the depression, and war after war. She had two kids with a man who would go on to abandon the family. And yet she soldiered on as a single mom raising my aunt and mom on the mean streets of LA. She was an original badass. In her 90s, she was still taking the public bus around Los Angeles. Until the pandemic, she still lived alone at the age of 100. They really don’t make them like they used to. Grandma Amada died this morning, at home, ...