Today’s sky was sketched with huge angel wing feathers floating on a crystal blue canvas, so beautiful! When I first walked Penelope the sky was full of jet contrails that were spreading and morphing into large clouds shaped like huge bird feathers. Almost fell down watching the sky while walking. I love gazing at the sky with its clouds and rays of sunshine. Finally told Penelope to stop and stay and leaning back on the crab apple tree next door, I feasted my eyes on the sky. The feather clouds filled the sky and stretched across both sides of the street. I was mesmerized by those clouds.

My most favorite quote about clouds is written from the pen of Lord Byron. “Be thou the rainbow in the storms of life. The evening beam that smiles the clouds away, and tints tomorrow with prophetic ray.” I think Lord Byron was telling us we should be a source of hope when clouds invade our lives, bringing light through our storms like God’s promised rainbow. Guess that quote is more about rainbows, though.

We can be rainbows for friends when their storm clouds gather. I have friends in my life that stretch across my troubles like a rainbow’s arch, bringing sunshine back into my day, pushing the clouds away. Rainbows are symbols of hope and renewal, a reflection of God’s promise to never flood the earth. In Chapter Eight of Genesis God says, “When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh.”

We can “be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud” by being kind and supportive, by being a source of hope and inspiration to others. The rainbow also symbolizes God’s beauty and his holy light. Ezekiel 1:28 reads, “Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord.” Rainbows represent hope and new beginnings and remind us that troubling times will end. The storms of life will clear with our prayers and God’s grace.

Closing with these words from Maya Angelou — “You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them. Try to be a rainbow in someone’s cloud. Do not complain. Make every effort to change things you do not like. If you cannot make a change, change the way you have been thinking. You might find a new solution.” 

“Life experience is like a rainbow; It has all the colors — some we love, some we don’t love as much, but seen altogether it’s beautiful.” — Gillian Duce