Ka-BOOM!

I'm in the middle of a nefarious thunder and lightening storm! Not metaphorically, either, but literally. I love this. I was waiting for this! I thought I wouldn't have one until summer...silly me. I heard the crack of noise and, after my initial pause of doubt, I turned off the much-too-big flat screen t.v. (I had had enough of the made-for-television documentary about Who Hillary Clinton Is), snatched up my laptop, and ran up the plushly carpeted stairs. I turned off the lights in my bedroom, reached for my ever-ready Nikon, and posted up in uncomfortable positions right outside my widely open window, waiting. I waited so long, braced and listening to the plop of rain drops hitting the top of my car, parked down below; and when the time came for me to shoot, my trusty Nikon just wouldn't focus in time and I hit the trigger too late. So I auto-focused first, waited, patiently looked through the eye piece, my finger poised on the trigger....waited....BOOM! And SNAP! I pull my face back, my thumb hits the play back, I hold my breath, and then I saw my shot: a beautiful span of the Arizona night sky, brightly illuminated with a sawtoothed beam of light.

I stood watching the dancing and fighting in the clouds (Zeus and Juno once again fighting over that hussy of a bull, I suppose). The wind was light and felt so heavenly coming through my darkened room, which would only become illuminated by the contentious bolts in the sky and the echoed target of my lens.

Driving home tonight, I saw one of the most ethereal sunsets I have ever seen in my life--save for the one I experienced at the Grand Canyon five years ago. Not really so surprising that such seraphic sunsets would occur in the same state...I kept smiling and gasping at the sky as I drove along the freeway this evening after my second day of work, heading westbound towards home, but fearful that in the next instant the sun would dip further and the brilliant orange would deepen into a subdued purple and hasten away in to the evening. But not so! The sky turned an illustrious shade of magenta and the bold streaks of color stretched out towards me instead of further away as the sun dipped deeper and deeper. I couldn't help but roll down all four windows as I steered towards my exit and turned in the direction of home, which brought me alongside the setting of the sun rather than heading straight towards it. As I strolled through the first of several lazy green lights, I had no choice but to turn the volume up a little more when The Pretenders came on. ("Gonna make you, make you love me...!") Gales of wind that do not give me unwelcome goosebumps or hit me with miserable force is rare, so I had to smile at the realization that I was loving and welcoming the breeze as it whipped through my car and lifted my skirt in a way that only a truck driver could have appreciated. Thank Goodness there were none around, considering that I was passing by Swift Trucking's national office!

Today I was introduced to Alice, an affiliate board and founding member. She smiled, shook my hand, and exclaimed, "So glad to finally meet you! So you're our Barack Obama, eh?"

(Oh my!)

I am so fortunate to have this opportunity to be in such a beautiful region, where I get to be this colorful state's Community Organizer for the one organization I have dreamed of working for since high school.

Thank you, Lord, thank you.