Driving up Federal Highway the other day I noticed that the old abandoned hotel at the corner of Dania Beach Boulevard had been torn down. When I expressed regret, Hania wondered why, asking if the building had been particularly attractive.
It wasn't. It was an undistinguished, three- or four-story block. But passing it you thought of its past, the people who stayed there, the dramas that took place within its walls. A nondescript building - especially a hotel - is still evocative, while a vacant lot is simply vacant.
