Sometime during COVID I began to notice clouds.
Fifty-one years old, started noticing clouds, for the first time.
Before now, just words and speed and laughing and winning and losing.
Now, always looking up. Now, clouds seemed to be about half of everything.
Nearly wrecked the car taking photos out the windshield.
Lost tennis matches because of beautiful cloud formations overhead, couldn’t keep my mind on golf.
“Look at those clouds!” I started telling my daughter, my wife, my best friend.
(And soccer parents at games and other acquaintances, and people standing next to me at bus stops—
all of whom thought the obsession eccentric at best; what was this fool going to “discover” next—dust flakes?)
“It’s hard to get used to Cloud Murr,” my old pal sighed, and his young son laughed.
But after a year or so, the pal and the son and I slipped, cloud-like, into a group text,
Devoted to showing one another nice cloud formations.
“Nice!”
“Gorgeous.”
“Sweet.”
“Awesome.”
“Wow, that is impressive.”
My wife started sending me shots of clouds, out the car window on I-80 in Iowa.
Now I’m getting pictures of clouds from so many of my friends and family members.
The other day, I sat next to the 10-year-old daughter of my old friend, on a Chicago River architecture tour. It was chilly, and she was huddled in a hooded sweater, not listening to the guide blather on.
“Hey Dave,” she said, pointing at the sky. “How do you like those clouds?”
I said, “I like them a lot. How about you?”
Clouds are great. I got pretty good at reading the weather by looking at the clouds. That was important when we were sailing. You can pretty accurately predict the weather for the next 24 hours by the clouds. You have taken up a wonderful occupation
I can’t read jack, Gail. But I find it’s always good to look up.