The city of Houston is once again bracing for another hurricane. Hurricane Beryl has made landfall over Texas as a Category 1 storm. Texans across the state braced for the weather that they have grown accustomed to. The continuous 500-year storms every other year have shocked the city into a place where the residents come together to help one another. 

In 2017, when another great tragedy, Hurricane Harvey, hit the Houston area, the community worked together. The storm affected nearly 13 million people and displaced around a million. Residents had to be rescued off roofs on kayaks and whatever boats people had. The Cajun Navy, a group of volunteers involved in search and rescue efforts, showed up too. Many people lost everything. Nevertheless, during that tragedy, members of the community showed up for each other. Neighbors and businesses alike opened their doors as shelters for people in need. The community rallied behind each other as “Houston strong.”

That’s Houston — that special kind of culture that comes in either our way during the storms or playoff sports.

Try again, try again, try again. There’s no reason this city should exist. There is no way our people should have the kind of drive to keep showing up for one another. It’s hot and sticky. You could eat the air with a spoon because it is so humid 10 months out of the year. SB Nation said Houston is where the trend of wearing backpacks with one strap was invented because wearing them in the way they’re intended will make the backpack squish-meld into your skin through your shirt. It’s gross, and catastrophe occasionally shoots like a geyser out of the Gulf of Mexico. Why does this place continue to exist?

It doesn’t matter. It is here. There’s NASA. There’s a lot of oil and a port, and the whole city keeps sprawling to the point where it’s nearly three times the size of Chicago. Houston covers around 9,444 square miles — an area larger than five states, including New Hampshire, New Jersey, and Connecticut. It just hasn’t stopped growing. The city has more square mileage than Denver, Detroit, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Atlanta combined. The city has enough suburbs that they could divide and become new cities. Houston has defied the odds by coming back from hurricanes stronger, continuously growing, and even winning impossible sports victories.

Yet Houston knows what these tragedies look like. These moments bring Houstonians together like no other. It is not a good thing that these happen, but I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else without my friends and neighbors. It doesn’t matter who you supported in an election or whether you actually like the Astros. Community members show up in droves to volunteer at shelters and open their arms to each other. They protect and serve each other fiercely, even in the face of tragedy. 

The thing that should not be exists, and it’s huge. When parts of it don’t work, they’re modified and rebuilt. And then, they’re rebuilt again and again. 

So the community is doing exactly what it knows how to do. As the hurricane throws down trees and knocks down power lines, Houstonians are coming together again. Sure, there are limits on how much food, water, and brisket you can buy at the grocery store. But local churches and even jiujitsu gyms that are dry are opening their doors so that people can come together, take a shower, and stay away from the storm together. This is a lesson in how we have to hope for the country. It is neighbors working together, no matter what.

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Currently, people who can be outside are helping rescue people and their pets from flooding houses. People are whipping out their chainsaws to clear downed trees from the middle of the road. The Cajun Navy has once again mobilized, and Gallery Furniture is open again as it prepares to help this community. 

That’s what Houston is, though: a community that knows how to rally together. That is what they will do again.