Thirty-five years ago during the early nineties, my folks were ‘Winter Texans” staying at a Christian RV Park near Harlingen, in south Texas near the Rio Grande River and the Mexican border. My father had an unfortunate accident and died while here.

I flew down from Canada, having never heard of Harlingen or the Rio Grande Valley. My mother and I decided to bury him here, in a quaint, pastoral cemetery in La Feria, Texas. We were at peace.

Life happened, I moved to the US – legally – I worked, eventually retired and decided that I was going to see the world with a Ford dually pulling a honking, big fifth-wheel RV. Life was grand.

The goal each winter was to stay where it was warm. Throughout various winters I stayed in Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and the ‘Coastal Bend’ of Texas… Corpus Christi, Aransas Pass and Rockport.

I speak only for myself when I say that in each location I found something that I didn’t like, probably because I was comparing everywhere to the Rio Grande Valley. In time, I made it down here for the winter.

My first home here was known as a ‘Casita’, a one-bedroom home that has a very large driveway complete with RV hook-ups – water, sewer, power, even cable TV and internet – and that was very comfortable. It served its purpose as a winter home while I was still RV-ing and in particular traveling back to Canada in the summer to see my mother in her Nursing Home in Niagara Falls. During the winter, I got very settled into the ‘RGV’… doctor, specialists, accountant, lawyer and dentist.

My Florida driver’s licence got exchanged for a Texas d/l. I could vote and buy a gun. My Montana licence plates on the truck and trailer got exchanged for Texas tags.

When my mother passed, my need to travel back to Niagara Falls went away and my desire to RV waned. The trailer sat there, unused for the better part of two years. One day the insurance bill came in. It was time to make a decision. As they say in euchre, ‘Go high or go home.’

I walked into the developer’s Sales Office here in our subdivision. I walked out with a three-bedroom house; no extended driveway, no RV hook-ups. The era of The Hare-Brained Scheme was officially over.

Home, at last.

God Bless Texas.