Storm at Sunset ~ Water’s Edge

Fripp Island, South Carolina

 

A consistent summer weather pattern:

Morning is still and damp.

An hour after sunrise, the breeze stirs, roused from a dreamy sleep between dunes and surf. Clouds, exhausted with an overnight rain, have flattened and dispersed, forming a haze over the sea.

By noon the wind is steady and strong, the sky clear. The overheated land, takes deep inhales, sucking cooler air off the ocean. Clouds accumulate inland over marshes and wet live oak forests.

Late afternoon those clouds, over-crowded, pile into towering pillars that wobble about the skyline. Finally too top-heavy, at sunset they topple over and collapse upon themselves, like Castellers de Villafranca, tumbling out over the sea with thunder and sparks of lightning.

By midnight, the dark sea glimmers with intermittent flashes sinking over the horizon.

postcards from the road