Beauty is Before Me. . . Above and Below Me.{Photo-Essay}

November. . . winter starts to take hold here in Ohio.   The beautiful autumn colors that we waited so long for, seem to have disapeared over night, fallen to the ground leaving the trees cold and bare.   It rains, it's cold, and we have already had quite a few frosts.   I have already put the winter washer fluid in my car and have retrieved my trusted ice-scraper from the closet.  

Grey, colorless days loom over the Ohio River Valley.

 Execpt today.    Today Mother Nature decided to give me one last blast of color before the shades of grey and white take over.  

It started today around 3:30pm.  The clouds were twisting themselves into all sorts of delightful shapes.   Even though I am twenty-two years old, I still cloud gaze and find animals, plants and all sorts of fantastic ameoba like designs in the artistic atmosphere.   What do you see in this one?  I'll post what I saw after a few people have posted their 'sights'.

The clouds prompted me to go cloud / sunset chasing.  I really had intended to go home and work on laundry.  But someone else was in charge today. . no mundane domestic chores now! I must go insearch of something, something in the sky.  

Like a firey blaze the sky is painted orange, rust and every other warm shade inbetween.  But this was not the treasure I was being drove on to discover.  Onward! Go West I must. . .

And so I keep driving, on to my favorite spot on the lake, which faces nearly due west.

And here I find my jewel-toned wonderland.  The pallet of autumn leaves in their golden, rust and amber hues maybe gone but the ever changing canvas of the sky gives a much needed brightness to the stark beauty of the winter forest.

I wish every one of you could have seen this in person.  It was awe inspiring.  Photos do not even begin to do it justice.

The light begins to fail, and slowly the technicolor sky fades into twilight.

And just as quickly as it was gifted to me, it faded away.   I should have taken a picture of the rich purplish-black it turned after this, but I was too amazed to really pay attention that  the sun had entirely set.    I left the lake and woods today knowing that beauty is around us always, we just have to be willing to chase the dream sometimes.

"Now I walk in Beauty,

Beauty is before me.

Beauty is behind me,

above and below me".

---Traditional Navajo Song