I am no scientist but have to agree the Lord must have a sense of humor about the weather. A couple of days back the global warming folks were preparing to meet with legislators in Washington but had to cancel because of the blizzard conditions in D.C. It just doesn’t get any better than that, does it?

There is much talk about weather affecting our local schools but that issue goes back a few years before the current snowflakes. In the heyday of the Pocahontas coalfields, almost every community had a local school. In Tazewell County, children in Boissevain walked to their own grade school just the same as the boys and girls across the hills in McDowell County’s bustling Jenkinjones. Ramsey Street School across from the Bluefield Sanitarium was always crowded with youngsters who walked to class from their homes, like their friends down at Wade School or over at Genoa Jr. High. It was the same in communities like Amonate and Bishop, where students, children of coal miners, walked to their neighborhood schools. Nobody worried about bus schedules because most homes were within sight of the buildings.

Sadly, most of those schools are only memories of a time when government generally left schools alone. Mom ruled the roost at home, and with few exceptions the child care was her responsibility with never a thought of an outside baby sitter. Heaven help the child who got in trouble at school because the punishment was going to be twice as much at home. It is amazing how much education was dispensed in those days when children learned to do math in their heads, read books and newspapers pretty well without being made to, and took their hats off when they came in from outside. Both parents made certain of that and the kitchen table always doubled as the homework center once supper was over.

It’s hard for many today to understand just important those little schools in Mercer County, McDowell County, and Buchanan County, too, were to communities in coal country. They were the heart of the area where they were and a place where pride was mighty important. When they closed, a lot of the old-fashioned values went with them. It isn’t all bad today, of course, but so many issues are more than weather related. Politics and the dominant dollar have done much to slice through the heartland in scores of states since many of our readers were born.

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The possibilities of restoration in Pocahontas is great news. With all of the talk concerning King Coal in recent months, it is delightful to think that the place where our great coalfields in the mid-Atlantic started is possibly going to be re-born. Town officials, including mayor Adam Cannoy and the Town Council, along with treasurer Greg Jones, are working on a three-fold plan to give the historic coal capital a brand new look toward a grand past.

The old days when the road up toward Peel Chestnut Mountain crawled directly under the Pocahontas Fuel Company tipple, just up the road from the Central Shop at Paradise and across the hollow from the Mule Barns and giant slate dump (where in later years Piper Cub airplanes landed about three time a week) were filled with hustle and bustle.

It would be nice to have that happen again. Tazewell County and Virginia officials are on board and eager to help Pocahontas citizens get it going. The new ATV trail is another bonus with rewards yet to be determined. At this point, sprucing up the historic store fronts and giving new business incentives for the future all sound good. Pocahontas needs a good restaurant, perhaps a grocery store, merchandise shops, etc., to help the hoped-for visitors as well as the residents in and around the town now.

The meeting tonight is slated for 6:30 p.m. in the Gaza Kovach Auditorium in the Pocahontas High School building and organizers are hoping for a standing-room crowd. When one community prospers, it can only help everyone else.

After all this snow and bad weather, it is truly an opportunity to get out of the house and help Pocahontas get the community support that government officials are looking for so that the town can secure this grant money and start making good things happen.

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Local residents are certainly eager for spring’s return and hopeful that legislators will be able to help them with utility rates. Thermostats are turned lower, blankets are being used more, firewood and kerosene are suddenly much more popular, and it has become convenient to turn lights off when leaving a room. Hot water heaters and clothes driers are not being used for as many light loads on these frigid days.

Electric bills have often been higher than rent or home payments in the past two months, forcing drastic changes and often causing panic. People are sometimes choosing between paying the AEP bill or buying groceries.

Please, Mr. Robin, get here as fast as possible!

Larry Hypes is a teacher at Tazewell High School and a columnist for the Daily Telegraph.