Clark's Spot

I turned on The Weather Channel shortly after I woke up this morning. It’s not an everyday routine; I was merely checking to see how many more days of October we would have in August.

The channel almost immediately went live to its reporter covering Hurricane Dean hitting Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula. Jim Cantore, the meteorologist whose appearance signals a hurricane as surely as 20-foot waves and 150-mile-per-hour winds, was broadcasting from Puerto Aventura. Interesting, I thought, that’s where I was one month ago today.

I told my wife to turn on her television. The more we watched, the more it looked as though The Weather Channel was broadcasting from the exact resort we stayed at during our honeymoon. The cameraman eventually pulled back and began to pan over the resort. We recognized it immediately. The Aventura Spa Palace was getting hammered by Hurricane Dean.

One month ago was the day we returned from our honeymoon. On the way to the airport, I asked our driver what happens when a storm hits the tourism-driven Riviera Maya. “If you have a cement house, you stay in your house,” he said. “If you do not have a cement house, you leave your home and look for a friend with a cement house.” People head inland, our driver said. The area averages a hurricane about every 5 years. The last time they were hit badly, he said, was four years ago. “The economy was very bad for six months then,” the driver said. “Nobody had jobs because nobody visited.”

I hope they finish the repairs quickly.

I just returned from a visit to Palmerton, Pennsylvania, a town of just more than 5,000 people in Carbon County. I drove to Palmerton today to attend a grave marking ceremony for the Sons of the American Revolution. Descendants of Conrad Solt – two separate branches – discovered each other while researching his grave. Today, the two families (I’m not related) met for the first time and placed a small marker to honor their ancestor and to preserve his record of service in the American Revolution.

As we stood in the churchyard cemetery, we talked about the history of the area. During the Revolutionary War era, residents used the Blue Mountains as a barrier to escape attacks from hostile Native Americans. Tracking families through the years means searching in communities on both sides of the mountain.

I looked up at the mountain towering above us. Farms dotted the sides of the surrounding hillsides, and trees and fields covered most of the scenery. The church was at the end of the road leading out of town. I realized this was similar to the way the area appeared 220 years ago, as Conrad Solt began his life after the Revolution. In fact, this resembled most towns in the early United States.

I sometimes bemoan the fact that I’m not in a large metropolitan city. I see it as encouraging, and inhibiting, my travel. My trip today was a reminder that most of America both now, and throughout its history, is small towns. Many of us, and our families, end up in tiny churchyards. The vibrant cities, while exciting, aren’t solely America.