If you had coffee at the home of Priscilla Cortez and wanted sugar, all she had to do was stir it with her thumb.

The sweet lady died Feb. 28 in her home. Natural causes, the coroner said. She was 77.

"She had just been given a clean bill of health," said her daughter, Joann Saitta, of Littleton.

She died 10 months after her husband, Bill.

"In almost every picture we have of them, her head is leaning onto my dad, her head on his chest, over his heart," Saitta said. "It wasn't so much that she died of a broken heart, but a lonely heart - no chest to lean into."

Mrs. Cortez was born April 5, 1929, in Magdalena, N.M., to Filiberto and Virginia Baca Gonzales.

She grew up in La Junta, where her family farmed and ranched. When she was 20, her mother died, so she moved to Pueblo to live with her brother.

She soon met Bill Cortez, who had a weekend pass from the old Camp Carson, where he was stationed. He was in the Army but dressed in a civilian suit. Good thing, because Mrs. Cortez had been warned about dating military men.

"If he had been wearing his uniform, my mom wouldn't have dated him," Saitta said.

They started dating.

"I was already crazy in love with him," Mrs. Cortez said in this column 10 months ago. They waited to get married, though, because Mr. Cortez was shipped off to the Korean War.

"I waited for him," Mrs. Cortez said. "I wasn't going to let anybody else snatch him up after I waited that long."

They were married Oct. 18, 1952, in Raton, N.M.

They lived in California, then settled in Denver in 1967.

Mrs. Cortez worked in the cafeteria at West High School.

But her main job was her family, three daughters and a son she outlived.

Saitta wrote a tribute for Mother's Day, which was published in La Voz in 1992. Only the date has changed. The sentiment is the same.

"My mom is a wonderfully soft and compassionate woman with an outward glow and an inner beauty," Saitta wrote. "Even though she doesn't have a mean streak in her body, she's no pushover. If you're wrong, she's not afraid to tell you so. But she does it in her own benevolent way. I've seen her when an injustice has been served or her kids have been wronged unleash a temper that would scare Saddam Hussein."

Mrs. Cortez was an expert in the kitchen. The smiles from her family were her reward.

"Mom's house has this unmistakable warmth to it, and the smells that come from her kitchen in the morning - like real bacon, farm-fresh eggs with homemade tortillas with red chile," Saitta wrote. "Well, it's really hard to hide your disappointment on those rare occasions when she's not home or her pots are cold."

Survivors: three daughters, Joann Saitta, of Littleton, Rosemary Shahidi, of Almaden, Calif., and Patsy Cortez, of Lakewood; one sister-in-law, Frances Huerta, of Federal Heights; seven grandchildren; and 11 great-grandchildren.

massarog@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5271