Home sweet Houston

I've been back in town for a week, and I am totally feeling the Houston love. Sunday evening we had a few friends over. I baked cookies, CM made blargaritas, and we sent everyone home with bags and crates full of our stuff. It was a great (and productive!) night, and when we closed the door on the last of our guests, I think we both realized at the same time just how much we are going to miss living here.

It took a long time for me to feel at home in Houston. My first year was rough beyond belief, and nothing but the job brought me back for the second. But as the years went by, I have come to truly love this city, and that's mostly because of CameraMan and the incredible circle of friends we have built here. I've been here since 2005; that's the longest I've lived anywhere since I graduated high school. For all intents and purposes, Houston is my home, a home I will be leaving in a little over a month. And although I'll return for the fall, it won't be the same. We will have already made the big move, I'll be back to living in a generic corporate apartment—I think it's going to feel like I'm visiting.

So, in the meantime, we're trying to make the most of the time we have left in Houston, and trying not to get so overwhelmed by our to-do list that we miss out on the good things. We've started a list, dominated of course by all the things we want to eat one more time: fried chicken at The Daily Review, churros at Hugo's, frozen lemonade from Bambolino's, happy hour at T'afia. We're visiting all our favorite H-town haunts: the Zoo (of course), Discovery Green, the Menil, and more. Mostly, though, we're trying to spend as much time with our friends as we can. Meals with colleagues are being organized, impromptu dinner invitations are highly encouraged, and I'm spending lots of quality time with Shelby (she's almost 1, can you believe it!).

After a year like this one, with so much time apart, we're also just reveling in the two of us being in one place. For me, Houston will always be OUR city, even though I lived here for several years before we got together, and he lived here for several more before that. I feel like I discovered the city for the first time with him, and when we move away we'll be leaving behind part of the history of us. Luckily, if "home is where the storage unit is," then Houston will be our home for a while longer.

Besides all the fun stuff, there are practical perks to finally being home together. We've been talking about taking new head shots of me for months now, and we finally made the time to actually go out and do it. I generally hate having my picture taken, because for every decent shot there are dozens of me looking awkward, bug-eyed, or just plain ugly. Thank goodness for my incredible CameraMan, who finds the best light, keeps up the encouraging pep talk, and knows all the ins and outs of photo editing. I'm so happy with the pictures we ended up with, are you?