Silvia Claveria, 76: She was ‘overjoyed’ to be a grandmother

This story is part of an ongoing Miami Herald series chronicling the lives of South Florida COVID-19 victims.

Silvia Claveria dedicated most of her life to taking care of her family and children. She was 76 years old when she died on April 21 of complications due to COVID-19.

Claveria was born in Cuba on November 11, 1943. She moved to New York with her family and later to Miami, where she married Oscar Claveria (now deceased). Together they had three children.

She worked cleaning apartments for a few years in the ‘70s, but stopped working when her youngest son, Elias, was around 8 years old.

Elias, now 39, remembers his mother as someone who always looked after her children and brought them comfort. She supported each of them in their hobbies and took care of the house while her husband worked.

“She helped me to go to the school I always wanted to go to, which was Monsignor Edward Pace High School,” he said. “She would pick me up by car because I was afraid of taking the bus.”

She became a grandmother in 2018 when her daughter had a baby boy. Elias remembers her being overjoyed.

“My mom played games with him, running and playing like a child,” he said. “My sister would bring her son to play with her every Friday, and my mom anxiously waited. She would lift her grandson to her lap, and my sister would say ‘This is your grandson’ and she smiled.”

In her last years, Claveria suffered from swollen feet and had trouble walking. Elias and his brother took care of her, and she spent her days watching Spanish soap operas, TV shows and documentaries on the History Channel.

Her children had planned to make a ramp in their house so she could go outside and watch the sky. She died before those plans materialized.

In April, she had a panic attack, something she often suffered through, and was taken to the hospital. That was the first time Elias heard of the coronavirus and the last time he saw his mother. She was put on a ventilator and died of heart complications due to the disease at the end of the month.

Claveria will be missed by her three children, one grandchild and relatives. Elias in particular seeks to memorialize his mother as much as he can. He listens to “Contigo Aprendí” by the Spanish singer Rocío Dúrcal whenever he feels sad about his mother, and collects old photos because his mom didn’t like to have her picture taken in her last years.

“I’m going to go over the family photos,” he said. “I’m going to print them and put them on the monitor of my computer, so I can always have them.”

Alejandra Marquez Janse, a Florida International University journalism student, wrote this story for the Miami Herald.