In The Sky—It's... A Bunch Of Stuff

in #life6 years ago

We happen to live in a rural area that sees a lot of air traffic. There is a municipal airport a few miles away, and we seem to be along the north and south flight routes for the commercial airliners going to and leaving Portland International Airport.

Which means we get plenty of planes at high and lower altitudes. However, we also have balloonists and ultralight enthusiasts and even some remote controlled planes and drones hobbyists. There's an RC field just up the road.

Blue Balloon Overhead.jpg
Image source—Glen Anthony Albrethsen, iPhone 6s.
The hot air balloons don't normally fly right over our house, but this one did.

We've had private and military helicopters of all sizes fly over, as well as private jets. In fact, as I was writing this, a private jet flew over at a good clip heading south.

During the late spring to late summer we even have a biplane that buzzes fields around us. The pilot isn't joyriding—he's a cropduster and has been doing it for at least the 22 years we've been in the area.

Thankfully, nearly all of these flying contraptions are able to stay in the air as they fly by. Every now and then you'll hear of or actually see one of them fall from the sky. There's been at least one small engine aircraft crash as well as one or two of the one man machines, like ultralights, come down.

Otherwise, they fly overhead to whatever destination their pilots and passengers have in store.

We're also along the flight path of migratory birds, mainly geese, so we get to see them heading south for the winter (which will probably start in a month or so) and then come back for summer. They can get quite noisy keeping each other together with hundreds of birds in different V-shape formations.

Are backyard also seems to be a favorite gathering spot for smaller fowl like robins and starlings, which like to eat the strawberries, blueberries and cherries as they come on. Some of these birds actually provide a service with lawn maintenance by eating the larvae or bugs that damage the grass, but for the most part, I'm chasing them off when the garden starts producing.

We get our share of flying bugs, too, from bees to flies and assortment of winged insects. Some I don't mind having around. Others, like fruit flies, I could probably do without.

As we move on into autumn, we'll have the leaves which turn from green to vibrant reds, oranges and browns falling briefly from their perches on the branches to the ground. Thankfully for me that doesn't require a whole lot of work since we don't have trees in your yards, but it will be for plenty of others. That's okay. We've got enough yard work as it is.

In thinking about the leaves that will be falling, it reminds me of other things the wind carries and blows about in other parts of the year, like pollen, and the fluff from cottonwoods and dandelions. Fortunately, I don't have allergies, but I'm among the seemingly lucky few.

That kind of stuff gets me thinking of the possible contaminants that are going into the air by all of the machines flying overhead and the small industrial plants we have, along with whatever is produced by the vehicles on the nearby freeway and local roads.

IMG_1918.JPG
Image source—Glen Anthony Albrethsen, iPhone 6s.
We don't typically have three jets flying in succession but yesterday afternoon it happened.

We had another bad year for fires, and during a particular stretch of August we had a few days of haze, even though the fires were hundreds of miles away.

There was a building fire between us and the next closest town. I was leaving the grocery store and entering the parkinglot when I realized something was falling from the sky. It was sizable flakes of ash from the fire. It had traveled a couple of miles to land there.

So, you never know what's going to come from the sky, I guess.

That brings me to something we regularly have: clouds. While intermittent during the late spring through early fall, they tend to dominate the skies the rest of the year, along with rain and a general gloom. I don't mind the change in weather and the cooling off, but I'm not looking forward to about five months straight of cloud cover. Maybe we'll have a sunnier winter and spring like we did this last go around.

Because when the clouds are dominating the sky, it's harder to remember something else that's up there and very important to life and well being: the sun.

I probably should also include the airwaves, too—we've got a satellite dish on our roof receiving broadcast transmissions from space. The radio in my car picks up radiowaves. There's electrical lines which for the most part stay overhead.

Now that I think of it, there's a lot going on in the skies where I live. And that's mostly during the day. We've got all the stars we can see at night, along with the moon whenever it passes. We might even get a shooting star, see one of those satellites, or some other celestial event.

Lots going on. I doubt it stops anytime soon. And yet, there always seems to be plenty of clear sky, too.

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Don’t forget the art that mother nature provides in its beautiful sunrises and sunsets!

Hey, @newageinv.

I guess I did. By the time I got to the end of it, I had more stuff flying around then I'd originally intended anyway. I guess I didn't go far enough. :)

The sky over you sounds very busy. And you have lots of visitors to your garden. All in all, an interesting place you live in - except when it is winter, I guess.

Well, it can be interesting in winter, too, just not in as positive way as it is during the nicer times of the year. :) I mean, watching people spin around in ice and snow every once in a while can be very interesting. See golf ball sized hail fall. Hear thunder and torrential downpours. There are years where you never know what you're going to get.

I see. So, interesting all year round, sometimes in a positive way, sometimes in a negative way. Jolly good! :-)

Hello @glenalbrethsen, thank you for sharing this creative work! We just stopped by to say that you've been upvoted by the @creativecrypto magazine. The Creative Crypto is all about art on the blockchain and learning from creatives like you. Looking forward to crossing paths again soon. Steem on!

Hey, @creativecrypto.

Well, thank you once again for this. It's been a little longer (not your fault—I was more or less limited for time for about a month), so it's good to see that I still got what it takes. Your upvotes and the recognition you bring to the work of those here is always appreciated.

howdy sir Glenalbrethsen! haha man I thought our skies were busy! we got nothing like you do. We are under the flight path from Dallas to Atlanta but those jets are already so high that they're hard to see and we see none of the other stuff you mentioned except helicopters that come over.
I wonder if there is any effect from all those radio waves and other kinds of waves though.

I'm pretty sure the waves are how the shadow governments of the world create mind controlled lunatics after they have hip replacements, metal plates put in their head or silver capping their teeth. :)

Who knows. I understand the radio waves are harmless, along with the shortwaves and the satellite broadcast waves. Microwaves, though—you don't want to be exposed to those very often.

It gets quite busy around here when the weather is good, four to five months worth, maybe. After that, everything goes into hibernation. :)

howdy back sir Glen..I'm glad we don't have quite that level of activity in our skies here, at least at the moment but one has to wonder with every increasing housing and commerce encroaching from all sides into what used to be cattle country with just miles and miles of pastures and ranches.

Oh, I wanted to ask your opinion about the Monster card things, I don't know squat about them but you were talking to Dave about them and I didn't quite understand you take about the whole community of Monster freaks! lol...it seems like everyone is already obsessed with collecting them! like many are already rabid and foaming at the mouth so it sounds like a winner to at least buy and hold.

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