Though I have called the Dallas/Fort Worth area my home for the past 20+ years, I have always had an affection for the city of Houston. My grandparents made their home there, mother grew up there, my aunt and favorite cousin lived there until recently, all converging to create some of my best lifetime memories in the South Texas city that now finds itself under water.

My grandmother would drive for 10-hours from their home after retirement in Arkansas to Houston, just to eat at Felix’s on Montrose. My aunt would drop my sister, cousin and me at the Galleria on a Christmas holiday morning for a day spent rummaging through old record stores and funky clothing shops. We would grab loaded James Coney Island dogs before heading south to Galveston for summertime jaunts filled with laying in the sand looking for sharks teeth, before standing to find ourselves covered…