Anybody Else Ready for Spring?

Snow Falling

Just a little while ago it seemed as the end of winter was near. It was rather mild, most of the snow was gone, birds were chirping, and some bushes and trees seemed about ready to join the spring overture as well. With lengthened daylight hours came the promise of warming sunrays and the end of winter’s greyness.

But cheered too soon, winter came back full swing. There was snow again and temperatures dropped well below freezing. I know, it is only mid-February, and I also really do enjoy a white Christmas, but usually some time rather sooner than later after Christmas, I could do without winter’s chill. I know you are probably asking yourselves now why I am living in the Rockies then… Well other than long and cold winters—and yes, I also just remembered fire season—it’s simply absolutely wonderful here.

And I have to say, when you look at snow from a different angle, it is not just some cold, wetly mass falling from the sky but a rather beautiful example of abstract expressionism.

Let’s Preserve the Skies!

Smog obscures sun and sky on an August morning in Beijing, 2016.

“Some call me nature, others call me Mother Nature. … How you choose to live each day, whether you regard or disregard me, doesn’t really matter to me. One way or the other, your actions will determine your fate, not mine. I am nature. I will go on. I am prepared to evolve. Are you?”
—Julia Roberts, Nature is Speaking: Mother Nature, Conservation International

Too often these days smog obscures the beauty of the sky. Sometimes this smog comes from natural sources like erupting volcanos or natural forest fires. More often, though, smog is human-made, caused by emissions from industrial production, transportation, or burning of coal or wood.

I sincerely hope that looking at pictures of the sky on this website, seeing the multitude of colors and the beauty therein, will make you realize how precious the sky is. And that it is worth preserving, for us and for generations to come.

Where Do the Rainbows in the Sky Come From?

Pace, 2015.

“Blessed are the peacemakers:
for they shall be called the children of God.”
—Matthew 5:9

Rainbows are multicolored arcs that appear when sunlight illuminates little drops of airborne water. They can be seen when sunlight from behind an observer illuminates water droplets in front. After a sunbeam enters a water droplet, it hits the back of the droplet and is partly reflected. Due to their different wavelengths, the different colors of the sunbeam exit the water droplet at different angles and a rainbow appears. The colors of a rainbow show the visible color spectrum of sunlight from violet in the inner ring to red in the outer ring. The second arc of a double rainbow shows the colors reversed.

Rainbows are optical illusions and not objects with a distinct location. The sun, the water droplets, and the observer must be in a specific lineup for a rainbow to be seen. Different observers will see different rainbows depending on their location.