My grandfather was a storyteller. From as early as I can remember, he shared wonderful stories with me—stories that made my imagination sit up and pay attention. I loved listening as he told Aesop’s fables, the story of Androcles and the Lion, and other fascinating tales. This was during an age when television was still in its infancy and storytelling remained a treasured form of entertainment.

But the stories I loved most were those he told about his childhood growing up on a ranch in Duval County. To this day, Duval County remains rugged scrub country, populated by mesquite, cactus, and other stubborn vegetation seemingly determined to stick, cut, and wound the unsuspecting traveler.

As a boy, I was captivated by his stories of riding horseback across the ranch. During his teenage years, he worked as a cowhand on the George West Ranch, located not far from his family’s ranch. His stories made me want to be a cowboy, just as he had been before leaving ranch life behind to attend business college in San Antonio.

One day, he told me about being thrown from his horse at a place he called El Frijolillo (pronounced free-ho-lee-oh). He described it as a thick, tangled cowlick of mountain laurel and chaparral at one end of a pasture. The fall was apparently memorable enough to remain vivid in his mind decades later. As a boy, I often dreamed about that mysterious place called El Frijolillo.

When I was barely a teenager, my grandfather arranged for me to visit my country cousins at the ranch. He bought me a bus ticket from Mission to San Diego and sent me off on a great adventure—all by myself, with only a small suitcase in hand.

The only thing I remember about the bus ride was sitting next to an older woman who had doused herself in an overpowering amount of perfume. I could hardly breathe and pressed my face against the window, hoping for even the slightest whiff of fresh air. Toxic fumes aside, I made it to my destination, where my Uncle Florentino, my grandfather’s half-brother, was waiting to pick me up.

Florentino was a towering man. When I stepped off the bus, there he stood—wearing khaki pants, a long-sleeved shirt, black boots, and a straw cowboy hat. He looked down at me with welcoming eyes, shook my hand, took my bag, and led me to his pickup truck for the nearly twenty-mile drive to the ranch. That day marked the beginning of a lifelong friendship with Florentino.

I told Florentino that while I was at the ranch, I wanted to see El Frijolillo. He laughed and remarked that this was the very place where a horse had violently bucked my grandfather to the ground. Then he assured me that I would indeed get to see El Frijolillo—on horseback. I grinned from ear to ear and could hardly wait.

My cousins made sure that I experienced plenty of great adventures. They took me rabbit hunting, led me on hikes through the brush, climbed with me into deer blinds to survey the land, and introduced me to horseback riding. I killed my first rabbit, and my aunt cooked it for supper that very evening. Unbelievable! This adventure was already more than I had expected.

But the greatest adventure of all was riding a pony out to El Frijolillo, the place that had etched itself into my grandfather’s memory decades earlier. For whatever reason, he never forgot that fall—perhaps because being thrown from a horse was a rare occurrence, or because the impact had bruised itself so deeply into his memory.

I was there. Finally. As I surveyed the place, I could hear my grandfather’s story echoing in my mind. Standing on that very ground made me feel even more connected to him and to the ranch land that had nurtured him. This was part of my history—and now I had become part of the story of El Frijolillo.

Decades have passed since my great adventure on the ranch. When my grandfather told me stories about life on the ranch, he unwittingly gave me a wonderful gift. He gave me a connection to the land and to my family. Best of all, he gave me a connection to the boy he once was. Now, whenever I think about El Frijolillo, I can hear my grandfather’s voice and feel inspired to keep the storytelling tradition he shared with me alive.