Friday, September 08, 2023

Freestyle Friday : Fossil Butte Clouds and Shadows


Wyoming is known as Big Sky Country, the sky is the same size, but there are places with few obstructions to see it.  When I looked out over this landscape I first noticed the clouds floating in a powder blue sky, building, drifting, and delighting the eye.  Then I noticed the dark spots in the grasslands.  Those could be differences in the flora, or patches with different levels of water, lower right there are trees, probably an area fed by a spring. But looking closer, and taking five minutes to study the scene, the darker patches are slowing moving, moving like the clouds in the sky, because they are the shadow of the clouds, lit from above, far above, millions of miles away by a bright star that holds us in its gravitational pull.  

Maybe the ancients had it right, we should worship the sun, the giver of light and life.  

Well that was fun to write, looking at the image, describing it, drawing meaning from it.  

21 comments:

  1. I think your thought nailed it!!! Many don't realize, without the sun?

    Were done, and will be on a dying planet, not that we already aren't helping it with a slow death.

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    1. The earth will recover, after the people are gone.

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  2. Some areas of the US are kind of know to us, but aside flom plains, I don't know anything about Wyoming. It appears to have stark beauty.

    What was the rather homoerotic book I read about ancient times about a sun worshiper? I think Child of the Sun. Actually, it wasn't homoerotic, just homo.

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    1. North and South Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, eastern Colorado, are a vast plain. Rolling, grassland.

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  3. I love watching the clouds and their shadows as they move over open expanses. I was in Montana once and immediately understand why it was called Big Sky Country.

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  4. Give or take a few, only 578,803 people live in Wyoming. All that space!

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    1. There are vast distances with no people

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  5. Freestyle Friday...fun, thought-provoking. Well done and bravo! I do love the vastness of the western terrain and that big sky.

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    1. A short, unplanned creative writing experiment.

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  6. I've lived my entire life on the prairies, true big sky country, and your description of the clouds' moving shadows struck a chord with me.

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    1. Looking at this reminded me why I took the photo.

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  7. I definitely think photos like that, and places like that, mean we should be worshipping the planet and not treating her like a garbage dump.

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    1. Mother Nature will get even with us.

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  8. Frankly, after this summer, I've had quite enough of the sun, thank you.

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    1. Did you hear the thunderstorm last night?

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  9. You've described this scene beautifully.

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  10. Replies
    1. Thank you, it was a great trip for photos.

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  11. Who says we don't ?

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