I’m always surprised by what catches people’s imagination, or mine.. My cloud discussions have done it; I’m getting photos of clouds from all over the world, including one from Linda in Paris (see below.)

Driving home from Saratoga, I stopped to look at my infamous big sky hill, and there was another cloud that captured my imagination. I haven’t gotten my Cloud Book yet, it’s coming tomorrow, but I have been online checking out the shadows in my photos.

There is something holy about clouds, perhaps because they are so much higher up than they seem, and there is little between them and the universe but sky and darkness.

This one I saw today, I think, is a stratus cloud. Stratus clouds look like featureless gray to white sheets of cloud. Depending on the ambient temperature, they can be composed of water droplets, supercooled water droplets, or ice crystals.

They are higher up than they seem to be. I can’t be sure about my ID; I’m sure I will hear about it if I am wrong; I’m brand new to this enchanting new obsession. Clouds are magical; they have all kinds of messages and stories to tell. They are waking me up.

I see this one as a tornado cloud, a staircase heading right up to the sun.

Linda Mathieu, a cherished and skilled photographer, traveler, and longtime blog reader, e-mailed this to me this morning.

She lives in Paris, and she sent me this photo she took this morning. I’ve never seen a cloud quite like it, but I probably wouldn’t have noticed even if I had.

You have to look up at the sky to see clouds, and most people are too busy and distracted making money and fighting on Facebook to do that. I took so many beautiful things for granted. I’m not sure what it means to be “woke” instead of “unwoke,” but if this is it, count me in.

Being “unwoke” does not have been appealing to me, and Einstein would never have figured out the atom if he was. It turns out Linda is a sky chaser also.

“I saw this cloud formation in Paris,” Lina wrote. “I’d never seen one like it before. It’s called an anvil cloud (cumulonimbus). It’s made up of ice particles and is flat on top due to rising air that expands when cold air is hit. I find clouds-and weather- fascinating. I thought you might like to see it as you are on your journey of cloud/sky photography which I am enjoying very much.
Linda.

Thanks, Linda; this will be a fantastic trip; I can feel it. Welcome aboard.

Skies and clouds speak to me, and perhaps I will one day understand why.