Why we should look up

Skomer Island, Pembrokeshire, Wales

As we move around in our daily life we are fixated on a wide variety of things. These things interest us, provide motivation, entertainment, connect us and form our identity.

There is one thing that has made me curious over many years, why do we not constantly walk around looking up at the sky?

There is a constantly evolving, moving, complex, beautiful canvas one could ever imagine right there, yet we very rarely speak of it!

Clouds can inspire those that who choose to take the time to look upwards, Rabindranath Tagore suggests “Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add colour to my sunset sky.”

Stockholm, Sweden

What could be more whimsical and imagination-stirring than a cloud? These transient puffs of air laced with water particles take on mysterious shapes we naturally recognise as children. In recent months alone I've watched in awe as clouds morphed into giraffes, turtles, bottles and top hats. With their infinite changeability and frustratingly untouchable height, it's no wonder clouds have been imbued with mythological and folkloric qualities by many cultures, for hundreds of years.

In Ancient Greece. According to myth, clouds were not clouds at all but a group of young nymphs called Nephelai, the daughters of two titans, Oceanus and Tethys. These cloud spirits, depicted as beautiful and transparent, spent their days collecting water from the rivers in cloudy pitchers, then floating up to the heavens. When these pitchers were full, they poured water down from the sky, nourishing the earth and feeding the streams of their brothers, the Potamoi (river gods). 

St Martin

An ancient Hindu tradition said that elephants brought the rain, and that clouds themselves were the celestial relatives of the white elephants that roamed the earth. An elephant's body was thought to be representative of a cloud, and they would use their trunks to shower the earth with rain.

Native Americans also created myths and folklore around clouds. According to the Skidi Pawnee tribe, who lived in Nebraska, clouds were the clothing of the gods of heaven. A god spreading its arms would cause the clouds to stretch across the entire sky. And the early Navajo people believed that clouds were formed when a great white swan flapped its wings.

Ukraine

“Clouds come and go, but the blue sky remains the same”Munetake Murakami

The word cloud' comes from the old English 'clud' or 'clod,' meaning a hill or a mass of rock. In the beginning of the 13th century, the word came to be used to refer to clouds in the sky. The official scientific definition of a cloud is 'a visible accumulation of water droplets or solid ice crystals that floats in the Earth's troposphere'.

Mackerel Sky

There's no doubt about it - there's just something about clouds that is utterly magical. And it's not just you and I that have that feeling - it's a universal phenomenon throughout history. In fact, a Cloud Appreciation Society formed in 2005 now has more than 35,000 members worldwide. The society quite romantically calls clouds 'Nature's poetry' in its manifesto.

Vlieland, Nertherlands

With members spanning over 120 countries, the society fosters a global appreciation of clouds through shared photographs, educational resources, and community discussions. Members can even submit their own cloud sightings, which are displayed in an extensive online gallery. Memory Cloud Atlas can be explored here and I really encourage you to do so: https://www.memorycloudatlas.org/explore.php

“I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now. From up and down, and still somehow, it’s cloud illusions I recall. I really don’t know clouds at all” Joni Mitchell.

Else of Uist, Scotland

Now, time to take a moment and look up.

Photos: All images uploaded by cloud appreciation members 2024