Rooted/Uprooted

My husband and I made a pact when we got married. We’d live in Houston for five years; then, we’d move. Somewhere beautiful with good weather that we could take for granted. Somewhere with hikeable spaces, mountains perhaps. Somewhere that didn’t morph into a lethal body of water every time it rained for days on end. Once, my car almost drowned in that rain with me in it. I spent the night outside a gas station, shaking and crying, waiting for the flood to subside.

Like all married couples, we made lots of promises early on. We wouldn’t go to bed mad. (We did.) We’d embrace each other every day. (We didn’t.) We’d move somewhere new in five years. (It’s been eight.) That last broken promise was way easier on me than him. Even though I hated many things about Texas, I loved many things about Texas. Aside from queso, my roots there were deep. It’s where I was born. It’s where I was raised. It’s where I became a functioning adult. He moved there for me.

I secretly assumed he’d put down roots eventually, too, and the pact would be rendered moot. But I also understood the longing. Houston is neither beautiful nor charming. The land is flat and sprawling, crisscrossed by a multi-layered web of freeways and built on a swamp. The mosquitos are tiny vampires, and it’s so fucking hot. But it contained the very best humans. Friends who fed us for months after we buried my brother. Teachers who cared so deeply about our children. Artists of every discipline, many of whom I worked with at our performance space downtown; many of whom I taught at the performing arts high…