Seventy-six years ago on December 8th, 1946, Doris Godinez was born in Managua, Nicaragua. Seventy-six years of care, protection, wisdom, and guidance. Seventy-six years of interconnectedness, spiritual traveling, and energetic generosity. And though she passed almost 12 years ago, the impact of her life ripples out through the present and into the future. I carry her with me everyday, and I am told I'm not alone in this; from my Lola Cely to my Tia Beatriz, Doris receives prayers every morning. I wonder how she manages to be with us all across lands and seas.

My dad tells me that Doris loved her 8-track of Freddy Fender - Before the Next Teardrop Falls. We played this for her today.

While I am in California, I wanted to gather some folks to celebrate her life. Though the plans ended up falling through, I felt her spirit with me throughout the day like a soft current of wise trickster energy. The more I learn about her, the more gratitude I have for her. She was pragmatic, helpful, sometimes a worrywart, and from what I remember she had an extraordinarry quality about her that would come out in subtle ways.

And so today we celebrate your existence Doris, in all that you are! Thank you for carrying so many of us through some of the hardest times.

A drawing in a notebook. In the drawing, a person with long black hair holds two amorphous objects in her arms between deer tracks to her right and to the left a mound with worms.

my footsteps are not my own. these tracks trace a path walked by many before me. with all that you carry, always be grateful to all that carries you.