The morning of July 23 1988, the world woke up to the news that a Juarez journalist had been murdered the night before. The New York Times covered the story. Most of the newspapers in Mexico had the same headline. Linda Bejarano, the most famous Juarez television news anchor, was killed along with her mother-in-law and a friend. Her husband, also a journalist, was the only survivor.

That same morning, as I was sleeping, the phone rang. I answered and heard a frantic voice yelling what was on the news, that my mother and my grandmother had been killed. My six-year-old heart stopped beating for a long second, and I was out of breath. I didn’t cry or tell my nanny. My four-year-old sister Karla was sleeping next to me. I simply hung up and feel asleep again.

I never understood why I decided to fall asleep again. I thought it was a bad dream. Now I know that was the only way of not facing what was real. When I woke up, I learned that all I had left were my father and my sister, and that my life would be different.

Twenty years ago, Linda Bejarano, my mother, was killed along with my grandmother and my father’s best friend. My mother was 28. She was pregnant. My father survived the attack.

I was too young to understand what happened. I had too many questions and I wanted to know where my mother was. Maybe that’s why I studied philosophy. Everybody in Juarez knows what happened, but to this day, the details still hurt me.

Every year since my mother died, the media in Juarez runs stories about her death, about how she was a brave journalist, about how the tragedy was never supposed to happen. She was the main anchor for XHIJ-TV. She wrote for several magazines and had her own radio news show.

There is a statue of her in Tijuana at the Plaza de la Libertad de Expresion and several international organizations have honored her life.

This year, for the first time, I have decided to write about her too, about how she wasn’t simply a journalist who was killed. She was a wonderful mother, who left behind two girls. Two girls who were single handedly raised by a restless warrior who fought for justice, Manuel Gomez Martinez, a man known to many as a great journalist, but for me, the most amazing father.

I have forgotten a lot of things about my mother, but the ones I remember I cherish deeply.

I remember the last kiss she gave me. I remember her scent and her smile. I remember she was beautiful. I remember she used to make me clown omelets; she would put two black olives as the eyes, a slice of tomato for the nose, a slice of onion for the smile, and ketchup as the wig. I remember I loved seeing them on my plate. I remember she made me laugh. I remember she loved me.

I also remember the last doll my grandmother made for me and the white butterflies she caught for me in her yard.

What I don’t remember are the names of the men who stole my most precious beings. I chose to forgive them a long time ago and to be thankful for what I have.

An invincible triangle was born: my father, my sister and I. My father says we are like the three musketeers. We have been together, never as victims, but as proud survivors of what our life has been.

People in Juarez stop me all the time and ask me if I’m Linda’s daughter. They don’t know me, but they all say I look exactly like her. They haven’t forgotten her. That makes me proud.

Even though my mother is not here anymore, I know she’s proud too. Karla and I inherited her strength, her passion for justice and her will to live.

This week my first philosophy book was published in Germany, I know she’s smiling.

Twenty years is a long time, long enough to heal, long enough to know that it was always ok to cry.

For the first time in many years, I will go to the cemetery, where I know my mother is not there anymore. Symbolically, I want to read her a letter I wrote and tell her that I still remember. I know where she is now. She is in my heart forever.

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Alejandra Gomez writes about Juarez for Newspaper Tree. Her book can be found here.