The things that really matter

Horacio Vilaró, businessman

October 2, 2002

Tags: Cross, Sickness, Death My daughter Sofia was born on December 24, 1983, and her mother died a few days later. From then on, helped by her mother’s parents and a large and very supportive family network, I took up my changed life. Six months later I learnt that Sofia had an incurable disease which would progressively attack her muscles, and that her life would inevitably be quite short, although I always hoped it wouldn’t be as short as it was. Some people say to me now: “What a burden it must have been!” But it was just the opposite: Sofia, whose name means wisdom, made life easier for all of us, because with her integrity and the way she faced up to her life and its difficulties, she was a life-line which reminded us where to find the things that really matter.
At the end of her first year at primary school, the school asked me to take her out, because with her disadvantages she was not going to be able to keep up with her classmates. I started to look for another school. I was lucky: I found Los Pilares, a school run by a group of parents who drew their inspiration from the teachings of Saint Josemaria. From the very first day, they told me: “If we teach people how to live for others, we’ve got to be the first ones to act on what we say!” I’ll never be able to thank Los Pilares enough for their attitude, and the education they gave Sofia. When I first heard about her illness I was scared about the all the difficulties the future would hold. It’s hard to let other people see you like that. I rebelled against it. I found it really hard. She knew she had a very demanding father: her limitations were only on the physical side, but it was tempting to be soft on her all round. I insisted that she had to try and walk a little more, she had to try and do things by herself… I used to ask myself: “Do I have any right to do this?”
However, her reaction was to be demanding on herself. She aimed to be a daughter whose father could be proud of her. When she brought back her school report, she’d look at me with an expression that said: “There’s not much wrong with that, is there!” She’d maybe have one ten and the rest elevens and twelves out of twelve.
All of that helped her to find a place for herself, and gain other people’s respect. She attracted a lot of attention: she was bright, well-informed, hard-working and knowledgeable. She never wasted people’s time with dumb conversations.
I was one of the directors of DESEM, a program of business work-placements for school students aimed at motivating them to study and gain worthwhile qualifications before leaving school. Sofia took up that challenge too, becoming group leader of a successful business project at her school. They won a national award, though not the top prize, and Sofia went up on stage in her wheelchair to collect the award in a public ceremony.
At home Sofia saw her older brothers and sisters growing, and passed on to them her own love for life, her sense of humor and her deep Christian faith, helping them when they forgot the words of the prayers we said every day.
Her spiritual stature was far beyond mine. And I don’t mind saying this again: when I first learnt about her disease I was scared, but Sofia was a blessing. She came and gave the best of herself to help us be better. She was an angel in our midst.
“Don’t complain if you suffer. It is the prized and valued stone that is polished. Does it hurt? Allow yourself to be cut, gratefully, because God has taken you in his hands as if you were a diamond. An ordinary pebble is not worked on like that” (Furrow, 235).