This Sunset Went to Eleven

In social media, I too often forget that anybody can read anything I say about anything. I frequently get asked what camera I use, and enjoy confessing that all my landscapes and cloud shots (practically everything I post here, save close-up wildlife shots) are taken with my iPhone 6. I was extolling the virtues of this deceptively humble camera in a Facebook comment thread when this bit of utter inanity flew out of my fingers: "I don't always expect Ansel Adams-worthy results, but more often than not, I get them."  I certainly wasn't comparing myself to Ansel Adams. I was trying to say what a good camera lives in the iPhone 6. 

Leave it to Corey Husic to excise my words from context, plop my head on the Most Interesting Man in the World's body, and make me laugh so hard my stomach hurt. Love my fancy watch; my hairy wrist! ahhh I'm laughing again. Thanks, Corey.

Another February day, another possibly nice sunset brewing. I looked out my window at the small cumulus clouds floating over at about 4 pm and knew we were in for an amazing sunset. With sunsets, it's all about the clouds. Come on, Bacon! Let's go someplace good!

I feel very lucky to be able to get to several sunset promontories on foot from my house. 

The one I had in mind was about two miles away. We were heading out before rush hour, and we'd head home after it was over. Yes, those cumuli held a lot of promise. 

By the time we got out to the main road, the show was starting.

It's absolutely amazing how fast things change when the sun's going down. Or coming up, for that matter.

 I was walking backerds down the road, shooting as I went. My favorite color scheme: cerulean on cream.

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And turning around, a scene that could easily be in Tuscany. But we're in a somewhat depressed region of Appalachian Ohio, and that's fine with me. Fewer people to mess it up.

It just doesn't get any better than golden light slamming up against a broken sky.

I was all over that underlit belly of the big cloud.

We were hurrying to get to a favorite overlook for the big show. It's really something, to be minding your own business, and then have this spectacular thing get going in the sky, and have to scramble yourself out the door and to your nearest viewing spot. It's a great motivator to move your lard, that's for sure. Here, I am referring to my own lard, not anyone else's.

Come on, Bacon! Move your lard! 

Thank you for striking such an elegant pose, with the wind bending the grasses just as you are leaning! This sky, worthy of Francis Lee Jacques, the great muralist and diorama painter.

I thought as I took this photo that that is probably the single most photographed mobile home in Ohio. It was looking pretty grand in the bounce light, with an inkblot in the foreground, and the little bluestem on fire.

I thought we could make it to one last promontory before the show was over. I caught my shadow hustling along, agog at the fire in the grass, the clouds pouring from it like prairie smoke. Only nothing was on fire but my lungs.

We stopped briefly to shoot what's left of the lady's slip that's been hanging from the second floor of an old barn I call The Toothless Lady. I'll never wear it now; it's in tatters.

We hustled through a holler and climbed the last hill.

Things were changing quickly to the west.

Alas, things were beginning to fade to the east. But oh, they were fading beautifully, like old baby clothes.

While to the west, sunfire combed through winterbare trees and melted the sky.

We weren't sure where to look. Old baby clothes and warm russet grass, or sunfire?

Agog. Sunfire wins. 

Whoops. Until we saw the pink glow. This is an excellent dilemma upon whose horns to twist. 

Then there was that moment when the western clouds became a school of king salmon, swimming north. 

And a great gray veil dropped to the east.

I had to capture all of it. Time for a panorama. The tiny camera in my pocket leapt to its duty. The inkblot in the foreground looked quizzically at me. I got the shot.

It was time to turn toward home. Puddles caught the last light, punching holes in the dirt road.

We got to the Toothless Lady and I paused to shoot her, the white slip still hanging from her gum, the last lit clouds drifting over toward nightfall.

And from just behind the little shed built of Osage orange, the first woodcock of spring began to peent.

Or perhaps it was the last woodcock of winter. It was February 6. I'd never heard a woodcock sing that early. They usually come in around the 19th of February. 

Whichever. It was magic on top of magic, and I was there to hear it, there to see it, there to drink it all in like the most luscious sky martini ever shaken.

It was completely dark by the time we crested the last hill. I looked at my Fitbit. 

11,111 steps. Well, what do you know. This evening went to eleven!

The Sunset Club

 I'm pretty frugal. I spend most of my money on food, a good safe car, and excellent optics. Sure, I'll do a therapeutic shop every once in a blue moon, but you can bet it'll be at an outlet store (Hello, Eddie Bauer Outlet and Warehouse, thanks for dressing me top to toe!) I pretty much loathe movie theaters, paying lots of money to watch something ehh, and standing in line for anything. Drag me to an amusement park and I'm likely to spend my time watching people and the house sparrows, scrambling for crumbs.  I don't like to sit down to do anything but draw or write, and half the time I'm standing at the drawing table. So: Frugal and restless.

One of the things I absolutely loved about Sanibel Island when I visited years ago was the sunset culture that thrives there. People actually plan for sunset. They walk or get in their cars and carry lawnchairs to the beach to watch it, sort of loosely together. I thought that was the most wonderful thing! A whole community gets that the best show they can watch is free, and they gather to watch it together.

So it is entirely in keeping that I've become attached to watching sunrises and sunsets. Sure, we all enjoy a good sunset, but how many of us actually make a date with them, and get up while it's still dark to assess the cloud/sun/sky potential, or prep dinner at 3 pm so as to be out for the 5:45pm February matinee?  I ask this rhetorically, knowing that too many most excellent nominees for the Sunset Club are likely to be on a conference call or otherwise locked inside when the show starts, and for that I apologize. Long summer evenings are coming!

The first thing we do when a meeting of the Sunset Club commences is get outside somewhere picturesque. The regularly meeting Club currently consists of a President and Vice President. Here is the Veep, reporting for duty. We have members in Maine, Whipple, and Marietta, Ohio as well. You can join. I don't even have to know about it. The only requirements are that you be mindful of good sunrise/sunset opportunities, pay attention, and are properly appreciative of the shows.

Tip: Try to attain a high promontory before the show reaches full intensity. The climbing is good for your heart, and the view is good for your soul.

Dress warmly. Temperatures can plummet near sunset.

Pay attention to the main show; i.e. the one going on, Stage West, around the fabled star upon which we depend for all life.  This goes without saying. BOOM.

However, you must make sure to spin around to take in the auxiliary show, which is often as good or, in its own way, better than the one on the main stage.

Yes. All of these photos make me want to lie down and roll around in the cold damp grass. Perfectly permissible, if you're dressed for it. See where the "high promontory" comes in? It's best to get up so high you've got unobstructed views both west and east.

East views can be gentler, less dramatic, but so powerful, too.

Don't forget to whip around and see what that star of our is up to, though!

In the Sunset Club, we do a lot of spinning around.

Watching sunsets is all about gratitude. It's about feeling very small and humble as something much larger and more grandiose than anything you could dream of goes on all around you. 

It's about paying attention, too, and setting your body clock to 4:15 pm, to look outside and notice whether there are nice clouds floating over, clouds with the potential to dazzle when lit by the matchless spectrum of the low setting sun. It's about situational awareness: not letting such a thing slip by because you were otherwise occupied. 

The Sunset Club is founded on seeking out your joy, and making a conscious effort to connect with it, no matter what else may be going on in your life.

It's about being thankful for all we are given, every single day. And that includes every moment of every day. Each one is a gift. It's up to us to use those moments well. 

Counting your blessings is an excellent use of moments. Phoebe told me to name them every night before I close my eyes. Good exercise. The child shall lead...

I'll leave you with a thought that Shila gave me when I was struggling. 

"What we focus on expands. Which is bad when we focus on fear and lack."

So I'm making a conscious effort to focus not on what I long for, but on all that is joyful and abundant in my life, the people and things, big and small, that I'm so thankful for that it raises a lump in my throat.

See you at sunset?