We visited the Plaza de Mayo on the Thursday between Christmas and New Years. The mothers weren’t marching, but they did staff a well-stocked information booth, and their presence was felt profoundly. It was hard to look at the sad-eyed white-kerchiefed elderly ladies at the booth without a sense of their profound humanity.

All around, the plaza is stenciled with white shawls like those the madres wear.

Signs declared their principles. Er, well, I think they did. I could read some of the Spanish but not all. Maybe you can read more.

Most moving was the wall of photo collages of children still missing.

Each of these collages was put together with obvious love and tenderness. And while some of the “children” were in their twenties and even thirties, so many of them were sixteen… or fourteen… or younger.

When I think about visiting this plaza, I am on the edge of tears. I don’t know how I could stand it had my daughter gone missing at age thirteen… and knowing that she’d probably been tortured and killed. Those very brave mothers.