I grew up on the East Coast. Living in Texas came later, folded into my life through family and circumstance rather than choice. I’ve moved through several Texas cities since then, enough to understand that each region has its own pace, enough to feel how history lives in families, not just landmarks, and enough to know that having roots somewhere does not always mean feeling rooted.
I have family here. History here. But I am not sure I have ever called myself a Texan with certainty. Not in the way people say it like a claim. I am not sure I have claimed anything outside of being Black, Woman, and a child of God. I have always existed slightly adjacent to the identity my lineage affords me. San Antonio, Yoakum, and Flatonia make up the cells in my body. But moving through Texas has felt more like passing through rooms than settling into one.
A little over a decade ago, I passed through Austin once. I had only a few hours to spare. It was spring break, in the middle of South by Southwest, and I found myself seated inside a tiny ramen bar that no longer exists, the air thick with creativity and a calm excitement that settled within my body. That day in Austin felt like the first day of spring. Not in the way of flowers blooming and longer days, but in the vitality and hope it brought. The city had an energy that felt inviting and alluring, drawing me in like a moth to mercury vapor lights, chasing sparks of the city visible only in those fleeting moments.
When I moved to Austin in 2022 for work, I thought I was returning to that version of the city. The version that felt magnetic and alive, without realizing how differently a place can reveal itself once you live inside it. I arrived in the middle of a conversation that had already been going on for a long time. Dialogue shaped by history, the shifting rhythms of the city, and the quiet work of keeping culture alive and visible. Some residents were navigating the rapidly changing neighborhoods beneath their feet, others bringing new energy and perspectives. Many were already exhausted from explaining themselves.
I remember attending events I was interested in. Creative gatherings, markets, panels, networking spaces labeled open to all. I would walk in hopeful, wanting to join the energy. I would scan the room, quietly counting, looking for faces that felt familiar. Sometimes I found one or two. Sometimes three or four. Often none. As the conversations flowed around me, I felt a little isolated, a little invisible. I wanted to enjoy myself, so I would stay, smile, and leave a little earlier than I planned. And when I left, the room continued on. In other cities, I had grown accustomed to encountering people who not only shared my interests but also understood the cultural nuance I carried without explanation. Here, that familiarity felt rarer.
For a while, I wanted to defend my disappointment. To compare Austin to places I loved, to cities that had shaped me. To explain why settling in felt harder than it was supposed to. But I started to realize that comparison kept me at a distance. It was easier to judge the city than to sit with my own sense of unbelonging. So I made a choice: curiosity over defense. Curiosity is walking into a space and letting it teach me something I did not know I needed to learn. It is listening more than speaking, taking the time to understand Austin’s Black history beyond the surface, and sitting with how much of it has been scattered by gentrification and displacement. It is holding respect for longtime residents who have seen their neighborhoods change in ways I can barely imagine, while also carving out space for my own experience as someone still finding her footing in a city she just arrived in.
Being new in any city means holding multiple truths at once. It means arriving at a place that existed long before you, while still needing room to exist yourself. It means learning who you are in this new environment. I do not think belonging happens all at once. I think it is something we naturally move toward, sometimes slowly, sometimes awkwardly, sometimes too eagerly, hoping what we choose chooses us back. For now, my relationship with Austin lives in between. No rejection. No claiming. Just paying attention.
This is the beginning of something I am exploring. A way to create intimate spaces for conversation, reflection, and belonging. Spaces that center Black voices in Austin, while welcoming any who enter with care and curiosity. In different rooms, I have heard similar sentiments. In different gatherings, similar questions. In different corners of the city, similar hesitations. The pattern feels too consistent to overlook.
As I was finishing this essay, I learned that the small ramen bar I visited during South by Southwest all those years ago is reopening in spring 2026. When I first moved to Austin, I looked for it. I wanted to sit in that same small space and see if the air still carried that first spark of possibility. But it was gone.
And now, in the middle of writing this, I learn that it is returning.
It’s only a Ramen bar, but, it felt serendipitous. A gentle reminder that what once felt alive can find its way back in a new season. Maybe belonging works the same way.