# @plusjames on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/B2qWQyQFv-1
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/20819062-plusjames-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/ae38196909.jpg
- **Posted:** 2019-09-21T05:34:10.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** James Ramos (@plusjames) — https://gondola.cc/plusjames

## Caption

“It was up to here yesterday,” he said to me, pointing at just below his waist. “We didn’t flood during #Harvey until they opened the dam. They didn’t release the dam during #Imelda but look, we’re flooded again.”
•
The last rainstorms of Imelda finally pushed through the Texas Gulf Coast today. When I walked up, he said “there’s more coming” and pointed to the massive dark clouds just a few miles away. He left his sedan at the front of the subdivision because it couldn’t make it through the first street. The storm fatigue is very real, and the twinge in our neighbors voices (sometimes our own) don’t seem natural, but they’re normal now.
•
I met a second-grader on the 2nd anniversary of Harvey this year. We walked together through her renovated school. She showed me her (massive) itsjojosiwa bow tied to her blue backpack. She said she lost her Dora backpack in the “big rains.” Her principal told me students like my tiny friend still cry when it gets dark outside during the daytime, like it did during Imelda on Thursday. When they moved to a nearby school, the toddlers asked: “Will the water come in here too?” One teacher told me one of kids threw away all his toy boats after he was rescued by boat during Harvey. They were kindergartners in Harvey, now they’re second-graders learning cursive, when there isn’t water covering the roads. •
He had been videochatting the entire time he walked the street. I saw him all the way down and made a few photos of him distant, then when he was close enough, I waved.  He asked if I was from the area, I said no, but that I was with the nearby church, the one that opened as a shelter during Imelda. I told him my hometown flooded too, that I was sorry the water hadn’t gone down yet. It’s hard to see, but *enhance* a garage door and two blips of kids splashing are above his head. That house is some sixty houses down. It’s easy to throw the massive facts and figures of all of these storms, but these were all our neighbors who are still hurting and will for a long time. His eyes seemed to ask me why I was there, but when  thunder roared, he looked over and said: “It’s going rain again. Be careful going home.” #storyportrait

## Stats

- **Views:** 0
- **Likes:** 56
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- **Comments:** 3

## Tags

imelda, storyportrait, harvey

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