Who paints the clouds?

I have always been a cloud-watcher. As a kid, I’d lay on my back for hours staring up at the clouds. As an adult, I’d point out the things I saw in the clouds to Kim or the kids as we were driving along from wherever. Finding things in the clouds became a favorite pastime for the kids when I’d drive them home from school, and it was a great exercise for their developing imaginations.

God's Stallion © 2020 Pat Babcock
“God’s Stallion” ©2020 Pat Babcock

When Kim was in the hospital last August to have a stent put in her bile duct, the clouds put on quite a show – we spent a lot of time looking at the clouds through the 11th-floor window, and I took tens – maybe hundreds! – of pictures. The picture of Kim in the header of this blog is a composite I made with one such picture. In fact, the image of her I used in that composite was captured as she was looking out at the clouds as I described what figures I could see in them.

Kim and the Clouds – August 2020

Clouds have always been beautiful.

I noticed a “new creativity” in the cloud patterns after Kim passed, reminiscent of obvious brush strokes. The following pictures are details from a single photo taken on my way home from some appointment or other 10 days after Kim passed.

Feathered clouds ©2020 Pat Babcock
Sketch lines in the sky ©2020 Pat Babcock

The clouds today were a masterpiece: at the same time dark and brooding, but with pondwater-like waves that exposed cheerier, sunlit clouds in an almost unnatural pattern. It is my conviction that God gave Bob Ross some time off, and Kim is now brushing the clouds. In any case, I look up at them and invariably smile – so, at least to me, it is the truth.