This is a story about a woman named Brunilda Virola-Lindholm, whose nickname is Bruni. The Cortlandt Manor resident was born in Puerto Rico in 1939 and had one younger brother, who passed away, and one younger sister. Her father was a fisherman and her mother was a housewife.
Her father heard the United States was the land of opportunity, and moved the family to America in 1947. After an 8-hour flight on an eight-propeller plane, Bruni and family arrived at LaGuardia Airport.
They settled in the lower East Side of Manhattan in an apartment next to her aunt’s larger unit. The rent was $17 a month for the smaller apartment and her aunt decided to switch with them so that they could have the larger living space.
Bruni and her sister were in first and second grades when they left Puerto Rico, but in the United States, the Catholic school would not put her sister in first grade. As a result, Bruni had to stay home for a full school year to wait for her sister to attend the same school as her. There was a language barrier for the sisters to overcome and Bruni’s mother didn’t want to separate them.
During the year of missed schooling, Bruni quickly picked up the English language. She befriended Jewish and Arabic neighbors and attended the synagogue on holidays. There, she picked up dancing and participated in a lot of activities.
As dancers, Bruni and her sister were chosen to represent their school in Israel. However, their parents were nervous about the sisters traveling outside the country so they skipped the trip.
Both siblings got their first jobs in New York City in a baby hat factory, earning $40 a month for the part-time summer work.
Bruni then worked at Guardian Life Insurance, where she was offered a prestigious job in their Puerto Rico office as the San Juan Cashier.
When they closed the San Juan insurance agency office, she knew she had to polish her resume, so she enrolled at a secretarial school. In 1977, she was hired by Puerto Rican newspaper the San Juan Star as Executive Secretary.
Being back in her native country changed her life. She became a self-sufficient woman, learning to drive and starting a small crafts business.
Bruni became very active in her church in Puerto Rico, joining a movement called “El Arte De Ser Feliz,” which means the “art of being happy.” She credits that with being the happy person she is today.
In the late 1990s, Bruni decided to return to the states because she missed her family. She found it a little challenging at first in America, adjusting to the climate of four distinct seasons and the wardrobe changes that requires.
Her American friends had not eaten Spanish food and loved her cooking. They wanted her to open a Spanish restaurant, but that wasn’t her destiny.
One of Bruni’s cherished memories is when her father took a five-cent trolley ride to Brooklyn to borrow $3 from his sister to buy milk. He came home without milk, instead having purchased an Irish Sweepstakes lottery ticket for that Saturday’s races. Her father’s horse came in third, paying him $18,000 (equivalent today to more than $200,000). He paid his sister back the $3… plus interest.
He then bought a home in Brooklyn for Bruni to live in when she married and started to raise a family – and her father never again wanted for milk.
Bruni believes we are all equal, loving, working, simple people trying to make a living and a life for ourselves.
With more than 80 years of blessings behind her, life has been good to Brunilda Virola-Lindholm.
Arnie Klein of Cortlandt Manor loves being a senior citizen.
