You get home from the store, all the water and canned goods you could find. You’ve boarded up windows and doors, and packed an emergency bag. You’re safe. But what about the people who aren’t? The people who don’t have sturdy walls to protect them from the wrath of Harvey? The people who don’t have the money to get the supplies they need to survive?

Approximately 5,351 people are homeless, and that’s in Houston alone. So what exactly did Texans do to protect the homeless? We first started by sending out volunteers to try and urge the displaced to move to a shelter as soon as possible. But there was still a large number that had not been reached, leaving them and their belongings to be swallowed by the record breaking floods. It was until 3 days after Harvey first hit that rescue trucks were sent out to pick up the soaking and scared vagrants and deliver them to a safer shelter.

But there were also others who weren’t homeless before Harvey, but after, their lives as they know it were gone. Over 100,000 homes were completely washed away, leaving hundreds of thousands of couples, families, and hardworking people forced out on to  the streets. Luckily, shelters opened up, churches let families in, and other families let total strangers into their home. Even Gallery Furniture unlocked their doors to let the displaced in.

Instead of leaving our fellow Texans out in the awful dangers of Hurricane Harvey, we opened up our hearts and let them in.  We are all still recovering, some more than others, but every single Texan knows one thing: Everything, including our hearts, is bigger and better in Texas.