Magnolia was already outside. She had managed to escape the collapse alive when the 7,4-magnitude earthquake shook Roldanillo, Valle del Cauca, on August 10.
She could have stayed there, safe, breathing the open air while the house continued crumbling to pieces.
But inside was Natalia, her daughter, a recent high school graduate in Bergenfield, New Jersey. And Magnolia didn’t think twice: she went back inside.
She helped her get out, pushed her toward the life that was slipping away from her, and in that instant a wall collapsed onto her body. Natalia escaped with an injury to her arm. Her mother did not.
It was her brother, an evangelical pastor in Colombia, who helped search for her among the rubble until they found her.
Magnolia was 57 years old, had been part of the Mercy Church of God community for more than two decades, and was the mother of three children.
She will be buried in the same country where she decided, without hesitation, that her daughter would live even if she did not.