Cloud Mystery
The clouds this morning made me really, really happy.
I was so happy, that I had to question what it was about them that made me feel so darn chipper.
Perhaps is because they made such a spectacular change from skies that have been either blue and cloudless or filled with sepia smoke for the past few months.
They weren’t just any old boring grey clouds, either. It was a symphony of mauve and lavender to begin with. Then piles of dark navy clouds budged up against candy floss threads of peaches and cream.
The clouds seem to mark the change in the seasons more accurately than the falling leaves. It’s hard to tell if the leaf drop is a sign of autumn’s arrival, or the result of the long, hot, dry summer.
All day I’ve been thinking about why the changes in the sky and the season make me feel so excited.
Partly, of course, it’s because I’m a photographer, and intermediate and changing light is always more interesting that boring old sunshine.
But I think also has something to do with “in between” spaces where more interesting things seem to happen. There’s something about seasonal change that seem to open new doors.
It’s like the edge of something and edges are always a bit exciting. One thing ends, another begins, but they get to overlap and mingle for a while. When day is turning to night, night to day, summer to fall, winter to spring: these times, with their transitional magic, are my favourite.
Of course, the other great thing about clouds, is what they’re sometimes hiding.
I could hear a sound like laughing getting closer and closer. A pair of ravens burst out of the clouds over the North Shore, flipping, diving, air-wrestling and squabbling their way across the sky until they disappeared somewhere to the south.
