Elora Nicole Ramirez's Blog, page 3

When the sun breaks in

I’m holding him against my chest, his almost-four-year-old-frame over half of my height. He rests his chin against my shoulder and wraps his arms around me. I sway back and forth, back and forth, just like I used to do all those years ago when we would be punch drunk on exhaustion and begging him to sleep through the night.

“Buddy, mama has a meeting. I’m going to put you down now, okay?”

He clings tighter. I turn my head to kiss behind his ear. When I try and put him down, he wraps his legs around my waist.

He hasn’t resisted independence in months. I shift my weight and sit on his bed, still swaying back and forth. I glance at Russ. He shrugs. Neither of us know anything anymore about how to parent a child during a pandemic, so we take one step at a time. One breath at a time.

“You okay, Jubal?”

He turns his head and rests it against my chest, his eyes focused on his window. Late afternoon light pushes through his curtains.

“You looking at the sun, bubba?”

“It’s trying to break in,” he whispers, his voice still gravelly with sleep and dreams.

“What’s trying to break in, babe?”

“The sun.”

“Yeah, kiddo. That’s what the sun does. It breaks through the darkness.”

//

It’s been cloudy all day today. Actually, I think since we’ve been home we’ve seen the sun only a handful of times. It’s just been a gloomy season all around. The literary vein in me would call this pathetic fallacy. The realistic side of me just thinks it’s been horrible for my allergies.

I’ve been lethargic for days — mostly sleep deprivation but also this inherent desire for quiet and solitude. Jubal wakes up so early now, and even if Russ gets up with him so I can get more rest the sleep is fitful. At night though, the quiet is so tantalizing I find myself staying up to read and write and breathe the calm into my soul. In other words, I’ve been fighting a losing battle with my exhaustion.

Today, I hit the wall.

Jubal came into our room before 5am, and rather than being crawled over repeatedly (these 37 year old muscles just can’t take the knobby knees and elbows of a toddler, y’all) I got up and curled up with him on the couch while he watched Wall-E.

Our day has been much of the same: cuddling, napping, snacking, laughing. There’s only been a little bit of tears.

So after we wipe sleep from our eyes from napping this afternoon, the clouds finally break and the rain comes down in sheets. I stay in my corner of the couch, watching it fall while reading a book. Jubal learns to cut tomatoes with papa. He brings me seeds dripping red and smiles, “I made it for you, mama.”

“Thanks, sweetheart. This looks delicious.”

I look outside again and and run to the front door. I’m afraid I might miss it. Jubal sees me and comes running after me, peeking around my shorts.

“Mama, what are you doing?”

“It’s sunshine rain, bubba. Look!” I watch as the drops glisten and am amazed all over again at how blinding rain can be when the drops turn into reflective prisms.

“Sunshine rain?” He curls his face into a confused question mark.

“Yeah. Normally, when it rains it’s cloudy right? And there’s thunder? But right now, look. It’s raining, but the sun is shining. Remember what we talked about yesterday? The sun breaks in — even when it rains.”

“Yeah,” he whispers under his breath.

He studies it from the door, curious. Slowly, he ventures out from behind me to the porch.

“Can I touch it just one time?”

“Yes, babe. Go get you some sunshine.”

And as I watch him walk into the sun and feel the rain on his skin, I hear the quiet giggles escaping him.

I smile.

Beauty still exists.

I’m sitting in our living room.

There’s a storm brewing outside, carried on the back of the last storm that bent our trees with severity.

It’s quiet in here, save for the wind rattling branches and the sound of Jubal napping in a rocking chair. For a moment, I’m relishing the silence.

I know, in an instant, this can all change. Jubal might wake up screaming because he didn’t get his normal nap and realized I turned off DuckTales. Someone may ring our doorbell despite our sign asking them not to and stir up Trulee.

We all know now how quickly things can change, don’t we?

Even still, these are my favorite moments. I stretch into these bones, and am reminded of the importance of rest.

//

This is what I’m finding out: there is still beauty to be found. In the silent walk during daybreak with my men, the moon shining her light on us while the sky wakes up to color. In the imaginative play of Jubal, turning a chair on its side and finding himself in a rocket ship fighting robots. In the laughter of friends as we video chat during a dance class. It’s in the intentional questions and checking in on those we love: are you okay? How is your heart? What do you need?

It’s all there for the taking: waiting for us, despite uncertainty.

//

I’m now sitting at my desk in the office. Russ has turned on a movie and Jubal has been, predictably, crying and screaming since I woke him up.

It is very much not quiet anymore.

But the beauty is waiting, just around the corner, and all I have to do is look.

when grief visits

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

Today, I feel grief.

Constricting, pulsing, living, blinding.

A friend asked, “how are you doing?”

All I could do was laugh.

“All of the women
in me
are tired,”

I replied, grateful all over again for poets who have gone before us in language and syntax.

//

Today, motherhood felt like cement. Everything I did brutal and permanent. Jubal ate lotion, drank water from a pot outside, smeared shit all over the toilet seat, and punched me in the face.

His grief piles on top of my own and I hug him close while he screams at me to let him go. I do, and I swat at my cheeks, begging the tears to leave.

“I know,” I keep whispering. “I know. You’re safe.”

//

I receive a text later while curled into a ball next to Jubal on the couch. My screen lights up and I glance down, read the words. My heart stutters. I will myself to keep breathing as I answer back, wishing with everything I have that I can provide some semblance of clarity and calm.

I don’t know if it works. I cannot wrap my arms around the hurting, but I close my eyes and wrap them in my light and pray that it will counteract the heaviness they’re feeling: in their heart, their skin, their chest.

“I know,” I whisper still. “I know. I’m here.”

//

We pile on top of each other on Jubal’s bed, our nightly routine of stories and meditation and giggles feeling slightly slower and melodic than normal. I wrap him in blankets and kiss his cheek and he lifts heavy lids toward me and smiles.

“Mama? Can you snuggle on top of me?”

I press myself into his back and wrap my hands around his middle. He giggles. I nuzzle his neck. I tell him I love him. His eyes shut tight and he exhales.

“I know,” I whisper in the dark. “I know. Rest easy.”

//

Russ plays his guitar in the bedroom while I’m hammering out words, the pressure of grief behind my eyes and thick in my throat. There is just too much that I cannot control. Too much loss and fear and lies. Too much change and unknown.

I close my eyes. I consider what I can do right now — right this moment.

I know, my soul whispers back. I know.

I breathe deep. I let go.

I'll lead you back home

When I got the email, the only thing I could feel was the blood whoosh whoosh whooshing in my ears.

“We’ve chosen another candidate,” it said. Precise. Just like the sharp blade of a knife. The whooshing subsided and I felt my chest constrict.

I found out….through an email?

The cut felt acute. Personal.
I got up from my desk.
I pressed my hands against my chest as if I were holding myself together — why couldn’t I get enough air?
I watched the carpet as I walked by coworkers reading my text.

I didn’t get it, I told them. I couldn’t wait for their responses.

Once I turned the corner into the hallway, my gait turned desperate. I scratched at my neck as if something were clawing its way out of my skin. I had no idea at the time what I was feeling was grief.

I just have to get to the bathroom, I thought.

When my hands finally shook the lock into place, I collapsed. Hands on knees, face keening. I had no idea why this was was hurting so much. Why was this hurting so much? Why couldn’t I breathe?

And then it hit me.

I ruined it.

//

A few years ago, I made a decision. I knew in my gut it was right, and I followed through, and then the world went up in flames around me.

I sat at my computer and read the emails telling me I was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Sitting by the pool, trying to separate myself from the onslaught, I received the text letting me know I wouldn’t be welcome in a leadership group I helped start.

“It’s just…you make everyone else feel uncomfortable because of you know. What happened.”

Did you tell them it was you who advised me to do it? I wondered.

“That’s fine,” I replied instead. “I understand.”

I read messages demanding and threatening legal action. I heard stories of secret Facebook groups and messages letting others know I wasn’t who I claimed to be — she’s not who you think, they’d say.

I’d get the screenshots sent to me, the sentences blazing themselves in my memory.

I’m not who they think.
I’m not who they think.

I gave all of my income away that month — split ten ways as reparations. An email came back then, too. “Before I move the money into my back account,” it said, “I need to know what it is for, and what my accepting it implies, or what I am then responsible for.”

There were a few times where I felt cracks threaten the structure of my heart, but that moment, for whatever reason, shattered me. It wasn’t the precision of a blade. It was the bluntness and weight of a jackhammer.

I got up from my desk and crawled toward our bed, falling into it and having no energy other than watching the way dusk danced across our curtains.

I collapsed outside on our patio later that night. Leaning against Russ, I sobbed and clutched at his shirt for stability.

I ruined everything, I cried.

No matter how much he tried to convince me, I couldn’t shake it. Why else would I be receiving this much hate?

//

I was talking to a friend about these two moments tonight. It wasn’t until I spoke of the breakdown that I was able to recognize the parallel of me believing in a moment of crisis that it was my doing. That the behavior of others was somehow a reflection of my own worthiness of care and support.

To be clear: I ruined neither of these seasons. I know that now. I know it like I know the hidden pieces of myself.

I know it. But I also know I had to go through it.

//

Both times, I sought validation outside of me. Both times, I knew in my gut where to go and what to do and began questioning my path because of opinions of other people. Both times, I allowed the presence and perception of others dictate how I viewed my own magic.

And I’m done with that shit.

This fall, I picked apart every piece of what happened while sitting with a mentor. He never told me what to do, but always asked me questions that inched the needle a little closer to the thread. Until finally I would find it and go quiet because I was too busy blinking away tears.

That’s what happens when you’re peeling away layers of bullshit others have put on you in order to fit within their own expectations. It takes time to excavate. And when you do, you’re emotional at the reunion.

“Oh,” I would often whisper.

This was why I thought I couldn’t trust my own decisions.
This was why I thought my biggest strength — my intuition — was actually a weakness.
This was why I hadn’t really tried building a community again.
This was why I was so hesitant with friendships.
This was why I hadn’t really written.
This was why it hurt so much.

//

Sitting at my computer in January, I got another email.

“Hi, Elora. We’d like to offer you the role….”

The only thing I could feel was how my entire body was shaking with electricity.

I read it again.
And again.
And again.

I laughed out loud and then swallowed, afraid of giving myself away.

I hit reply and typed in a response before I could do anything else: “Yes! I accept! Thank you!”

I fell back agains the seat of my chair.
Relief. I felt relief.

It was landing home.
It was waking up.
It was fireworks.
It was a sunburst.
It was taking pictures to remember.
It was the still, quiet voice rumbling deep in my belly: this is you. This is who you are meant to be — do not look away.

I knew I wouldn’t, because for the first time in forever, I knew my name and I knew my purpose.

A week later, I would be sitting at a bar and someone would walk up to me.

“You did a good job this week,” they would say. I would smile, and say thanks, and take another sip of my drink.

“I’m proud of you.”

And I would glance at them again, and think of the years I thought I knew this to be true. I would smile still, and nod, and say I was proud of me too. That would surprise them, and I would laugh, because I always seemed to surprise them by my honesty. But then I would shrug, and remind them that I belong here, and they would say, “I know.”

And I would let the irony rest on the sunset outside the window, because finally? It didn’t matter.

No matter what anyone else thinks, I know who I am.

I am not the Ruiner.
I am the Leader.

And I lead through story.
Through love.
Through intention.

And all I want to do is lead you back home.

On Oil and Magic

Photo by Ben Dutton on Unsplash

Some days, writing feels as if I have oil in my veins instead of magic.

Sticky. Thick. Dark.

I sludge my way through, somehow. And when I’m done, I am exhausted by the effort.

Usually, these are the days I’m wrestling with my words because the ones that want to come out are not the ones I want to share.

But creativity is a jealous mistress, and demands attention and veracity. She knows when you’re sticking with the surface out of fear of your own depths. So she protects those words and instead sits back and lets you fight through the fog.

If you’ve been around here for any amount of time, you know that self-censorship is pretty much against everything I stand for with writing. And yet, these words today feel slow and brooding. But I am here, and I am taking gulping breaths for oxygen and bravery and keeping myself as open as possible to let the words know, hey. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. Can you trust me?

Writing has always been a means of helping me understand myself more. The old adage is true: allowing yourself the space to find truth in between the lines happens when you least expect it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve started writing something and by the end I think, “oh. There you are, Elora.”

These are the pieces that make me feel emotional. The words flow freely and quickly, as if I’m chasing them. The magic feels potent and everything turns iridescent.

The opposite is true when I hide. I finish those pieces with a huge lump in my throat where I’ve refused my own words. I sit and stare at the screen, erasing and reworking sentences for what feels like hours. The heaviness carries; oil in my veins holding everything together until I can’t handle it anymore.

When we edit our own soul, we are broken down into a million tiny pieces. We tell the words they are too much. Too open. Too bright. Too free.

Who wouldn’t want to be open and bright and free?

There is an element of integrity involved in finding and telling your story well because you have to be willing to find your own code. You have to be willing to stand up and say, “this is the way I see it, the way I’ve experienced it.”

You have to be willing to chase the magic.

The Language of Trees

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

My mother told me once that the trees will speak to you if you listen hard enough. I used to think this was a little over the top, until they started speaking to me too. Their leaves whispered secrets and sometimes when I placed my hand against the bark I swear I could feel a pulse. Trees became some of my greatest comfort.

And then I found out that it’s more than just mysticism; they really do have their own language.

They communicate through their roots, underground, in a web of distress signals and sharing of resources.

I haven’t been able to stop thinking about this.

Above ground, trees appear isolated.
Below the surface, they thrive in connection.

//

Root was almost my word for 2020.

I soon realized power was going to be where I focused, but root still burrowed deep, waiting for when I would need her.

Like now.

When I’m not rooted, I’m like a leaf. I’m airborne. It sounds better than it really is: the slow fall to the ground is rarely as romantic as you would imagine. I find myself unable to focus, flighty, and unstable. Who knows where I will land? Not me. I can’t even see where I’m going. When I’m not rooted, I open my eyes from being in the air too long and don’t recognize my surroundings. I don’t recognize me.

I’m a stranger in a strange land and I have no idea how to get back home.

//

Here’s a truth: I know what it takes for me to feel rooted and yet sometimes I resist it like we do pain. Here, behind this screen, I feel more alive and me than I have in months. And yet, every time I open up a new white space I feel the fear begin to creep it’s way to my fingers. I think of the message I heard at the beginning of the year when I wanted so badly to do so many things and instead got the sickest I have in years. Rise slowly, my gut said. So I did. I put everything on pause. I waited. I recovered. I wondered if this part of me was on hold indefinitely.

Looking back, I feel the breath catch in my throat just thinking about what would have happened had I rushed forward anyways. Perhaps nothing, perhaps everything. But I recognize the way my body reacts as if I’m already beginning to detach from the branch and I inhale to root myself deeper.

Here’s another truth: roots take time to settle into the soil. And these past few years I’ve replanted myself over and over and over again, moving into a broader existence of living and space. It makes sense that muscle memory might not be as strong as it used to because my words are navigating from completely new landscapes.

So we excavate. We find the roots.

//

A friend told me a few weeks ago that she kept thinking of rebirth during this season where we’re all trying to remember what it feels like to wrap our arms around someone we love and haven’t seen in a while. I told her I kept thinking of trees. Of rooted systems reaching deeper and deeper still for resources and nourishment. Of one ecosystem breathing for another.

I watch as people I’ve never seen before walk past our window and I wonder if they know. I pause for a moment, take a sip from a cocktail Russ made me, and let them pass by as I silently send them hope.

There’s danger here, we whisper.
But you are not alone. Listen for our heartbeat. Together we’ll get through this.

Remembering to breathe

I like to pretend I don’t remember how to do this: put one word in front of another.

But in reality, it’s the only thing I know.

Last time I was here, I spoke of gathering bones. Little has changed. And yet, nothing is the same.

Instead of clenching my fists, I find myself holding my breath. When was the last time I inhaled, I think to myself. I close my eyes, open my lungs, and feel the relief of release. Even here, doing what I know best, I find myself pausing: do I have enough oxygen? And then I think, what is causing me to stop breathing?

Is it what has changed? Or is it what has stayed the same?

I don’t have the answer.

Last time I was here, we didn’t know how our lungs could just…stop working. We weren’t aware that in a few short weeks, a hug would be seen as a weapon. We didn’t know the threat of proximity. And now, overnight, we live in a different world, don’t we?

I find myself reaching for what is constant.

Which I guess is why I’m here now.

Every year around this time, those of us who create ask ourselves a question: what is it I could do for 100 days? I’ve done this through art journaling a few times, and one year I wrote almost 20k words toward a new manuscript that now rests in a folder on my computer. This year, as the calendar inched toward April and I started seeing people talk about what they might want to focus on to keep their attention toward creativity and not say, the destruction and chaos around us, I started thinking about it myself.

And it came to me quietly, settling itself in my bones and breathing life into the dusty spaces needing air. I’ll be here: writing. Because the truth is that I find myself in words, and it’s been a while since I’ve held the mirror up for my own soul. Maybe you’ll get something out of it, maybe it will be just for me. Either way, I’l be here. Excavating.

Maybe you’d like to join? We can remind each other to breathe.

xoxo,

Elora Nicole

Get Letters from the Creative Underground

Delivered weekly(ish) to your inbox

Email Address








Sign Up

We won’t ever give away your information. That’s lame.

Thank you!

Gathering Bones

I’ve been clinching my fists. 

I noticed it first while on a coaching call. We were talking about how people often give away what they love most — what they’re most excited about — by how they speak about them. 

I was talking about story coaching. 

“You know, it’s interesting,” my client told me. “When you were just talking I saw what you meant by excitement. Your face changed.” 

I laughed. 

“No, really,” she said. “Your entire demeanor just lit up.” 

It wasn’t until later, when we were done with the call, that I noticed the indentations in my hands — tiny half moons from where my nails dug into the skin. 

Huh, I thought. 

I clench my fists when the Truth feels too precarious inside my veins. Boiling over, I reach for something — anything — to distract my body from the heat within; almost as if by pressing my nails into the soft skin of my hands, I can poke holes and the steam would provide release.

.::.

There is a truth I’ve been running from over the course of the last six months. It is housed in a larger Truth, inconvenient in its persistence. The truth? 

I am afraid I have missed out on my purpose. 

This is why the background of my iPhone reminds me that I have no missed out on what is meant for me. 

Because the larger Truth, inconvenient as it is, whispers as a response that I am what is holding me back. 

.::.

When I came up with the name for Awake the Bones, a lot of it was because of Ezekiel prophesying over the dry bones in the desert, breathing life into them and watching literal bones turn into literal humans before his very eyes. 

But then I heard of La Loba — the wild woman of the desert who collects bones and when she is finished, places them by her fire and sings over them. 

She sings so deeply the desert floor shakes and the bones begin to wake. 

When I heard this story, I knew — more than I’ve ever known anything: I was La Loba, calling out to the rio abajo rio, waiting for these dry bones before me to take shape and breathe again.

.::.

I’ve been clenching my fists. 

And when I find myself pressing into the folds of skin, I pause. I close my eyes. I inhale. And then I imagine all of the bones waiting to be found. I gather them close and sing a song.

Get Letters from the Creative Underground

Delivered weekly to your inbox

Email Address








Sign Up

We won’t ever give away your information. That’s lame.

Thank you!

breathe

They say that emotions
come with your breath

So inhale worthiness
and breathe in
every
last
molecule
of hope and love

Sniff the air
for traces of syntax —
spilled in intimate whispers
laced with desire

Notice the way your skin
reacts to the air
the shivers starting at the base of your neck
falling slowly
to your arms
your chest
your back

Breathe in words
change
healing
belief
wholeness
abundance

Hold it all in —
rest in the pregnant pause
close your eyes against the wait
feeling the weight press in

And then release.

new

This is the second time I’ve archived my blog posts.

The first time, it was a returning.
This time, it’s a letting go.

A week before I archived my blog posts, I threw away all of my journals. All of them. Everything from 2011 on — which felt apropos, given that the energy I was so desperate to rid myself happened within the last seven years.

Here is a truth: for the past four years, I’ve been carrying around shit other people told me as though it were truth. And that’s okay, because for a while, it was how I survived and understood certain things that happened — both to me and to people I love.

But I’m done with that now. I’m done with holding other people’s shit just so they can breathe easier.

Why? Because when you do this — when you burden yourself with the thoughts and perspectives and expectations of other people — you’re choosing to refuse your own story.

When this happens, your life takes on this murky overlay. It’s like you’re living, but not really. You’re looking through a mirrored glass and can’t quite get the clarity you need to really see. And who wants to live like that?

So I threw the journals away, the pages chronicling the hardest days of my life. I threw away the stories of betrayal and revelation. I threw away the notes from coaching countless women. I threw away class ideas and ways to grow my business into an empire, as suggested by a faulty business coach. I threw it all away, and made space in my breath for the story that’s been begging for release. Bit by bit, I’m listening to her. I’m remembering what it feels like to know your story so intimately that no one else can speak over it.

It’s a powerful feeling, knowing the alchemy in your bones is no longer hindered by someone else’s expectation. It feels a lot like freedom.