Rainy (Labor) Day Musings

I’ve been taking a lot of nature photos lately. Mostly sunrises and sunsets and storms. I wonder what it is that draws the soul to water, wind and sky? Following are three sunrises, three sunsets and three storms taken throughout the course of the summer. Sometimes it's just being in the right place at the right time for one lucky shot; sometimes it's taking shot after shot after shot!

When Bill and I told friends and family over 30 years ago that we were moving to Pittsburgh (from St. Louis) we heard a lot of negative comments. Pittsburgh still had its smoky, smoggy reputation from the first half of the century but it was totally unjustified. When we moved here in late 1981 there were no steel mills operating within the city limits and many of the mills were being torn down for shopping malls and amusement complexes. In fact, during the 1980s Pittsburgh went through its Second Renaissance and even now is in what many are saying is its Third Renaissance. Look how the North Shore has changed in just the past decade: new stadiums for the Steelers and the Pirates; new headquarters for Del Monte Foods and Alcoa; and the park at the Point is undergoing a major renovation!

Pittsburgh has been named Most Livable City in the U.S. several times. Its housing values remained fairly steady and reasonable and unemployment is a few percentage points lower than the national average. Pittsburgh was successful in transforming itself from a manufacturing-based city to one of technology, health care and education services. I did just hear on Good Morning, America that Pittsburgh is the third worst city when it comes to fashion, but really, who cares? The majority of its residents have jobs and affordable housing!

So now that we’re moving south we hear concerns about heat, humidity and hurricanes. All valid, but I guess it’s what you get used to. There really isn’t a spot in the country where you don’t encounter some type of weather or weather-related problem. From earthquakes, tornados and floods in the Midwest, hurricanes in the South, blizzards in both the Northeast and the Midwest, constant rain in the upper Northwest, to drought and fires in the West and Southwest…where but in the Garden of Eden would you not encounter nature’s reminders that we are not the masters of the universe?

“He [God]draws up the drops of water,
   which distill as rain to the streams;
the clouds pour down their moisture
   and abundant showers fall on mankind.
Who can understand how he spreads out the clouds,
   how he thunders from his pavilion?
See how he scatters his lightning about him,
   bathing the depths of the sea.
This is the way he governs the nations
   and provides food in abundance.
He fills his hands with lightning
   and commands it to strike its mark.
His thunder announces the coming storm;
   even the cattle make known its approach."