Clouds and other things

The clouds are different here. It's as though God is an impressionist painter using the sky as a canvas. Huge brush strokes cross the sky ending in swirls of grey and white. Layer upon layer of cloud mix and mingle creating a beautiful landscape for the eye to traverse. I've never seen so many different types of clouds at once, each one separate but part of the whole. A meteorologist would have a field day here trying to interpret the clouds as they merge and split apart, every moment just a little different.

Botswana is flat. The ground is flat, the trees are flat. It's as if everything is in two dimensions except the clouds. We are in the Kalahari desert. We drive for hours and hours down the straight road with nothing to see but scrub and salt pan interrupted by the occasional elephant. The people here live off of the land and own some goats or cows that wander freely amongst the scrub searching for whatever food there might be. Houses are rare, and when there is one, it is small, usually round and constructed using cement made from crushed termite mounds. The roof is made of small sticks woven together with grasses. Perhaps there is a shed made out of corrugated iron but more likely than not there is just the mud huts. The yard is surrounded by a fence made of dead shrubs piled on top of each other to create a fence of sorts saying this is my land. Without the fence, the house would disappear into the vastness. Street numbers and mailboxes don't exist here. Instead your house is marked with a stick and a hubcap, or piece of grill or exploded tire- anything that will differentiate your round hut from the next along the miles of unbroken highway.

South Africa is different. Things are greener and lusher as you travel through the hills and mountains. There are signs of prosperity- agriculture, reforestation, houses. You can smell the difference in the air and you know, life is different here. The contrast is extreme. A couple of hours drive and you're in an entirely different world. You do not see people walking along the edge of the highway. There are white people in the mall and stores look familiar like Toys R Us. The people of Botswana are tough, they have to be to survive in the dry, harshness of the land. South Africa is softer, sweeter. Life is good here.

I am lucky to be able to see and experience these differences. I hope that I never forget to keep looking, to keep seeing, to continue to explore the world I live in. There is so much more out there. So much more to experience. Travelling, even just for a few weeks, reminds me of how luck I am and how grateful I am for everything I have in my life. I sit and watch the clouds as they roll by, the rain slowly hitting the ground in great big drops and life is good. Life is very good.