Many times LC and I watch storms approaching our area.
Mostly storms come from the south and west, sometimes from the north, and only very occasionally from the east.
For all intents and purposes Cody is located in a huge bowl that is surrounded by mountains.
The Bear Tooths, the Absarokas, the huge and endless and flat Big Horn Mountains - they all surround us.
We stand often on our front porch looking out over the mountain ranges and over the endless expanse of BLM land that also surrounds us.
We watch as storms struggle to make it over the mountains and when they finally do we always get suckered in, firmly believing that the storms will find their way to us.
They rarely do.
What happens more often than not is that these isolated storm bands (so isolated that we can literally see where they begin and where they end) circle around us.
Getting trapped by these mountain ranges that force the storms to change direction and circle around us before inevitably moving east.
I took these pictures about a week ago.
It was late in the evening, and just at a time when the sky was filled with different cloud types, promising but ultimately unfulfilled chances for rain, and setting sun...................
Many many years ago my youngest son Chris began to make some decisions under pressure from so-called "friends" at school, that increasingly got him in trouble - first with me, then the school, then with the police.
One day the police called me and told me that he was in jail and could I come pick him up.
He was only 13 years old at the time, but was already over six feet tall and everyone thought that he was much older than he was.
I had become increasingly worried over many months about my youngest child, and was indecisive about what I should do for him, and just how serious his problems were really becoming.
By the time the police picked him up, Chris had already been in some minor trouble with them and they already knew his name. Never a good sign.
I asked the police if they could hold him. They asked me for how long and I told them as long as possible.
They told me that they would hold him as long as they could, but if they needed the space for a bigger fuck up than my son was, we would have to come get him.
I hoped that they would be able to hold him at least overnight.
I wanted him to sweat and I wanted time to think.
Six hours after the first call, I received a second call from the police. They needed the space for another kid.
I asked my husband to pick him up. I wasn't ready to see Chris yet.
While I waited at the house for the return of my husband and child, I stood in the dining room beside the picture window, eating a bowl of cereal.
As I ate I stood by that huge window that overlooked the back yard, looking outside but not seeing anything outside, and feeling deeply worried.
Sean walked into the dining room.
When he came up behind me he threw his arms around my neck and pressed his cheek against mine.
"You'll figure something out. You always do. It'll be alright".
I could feel myself well up as I fought back sudden and unexpected tears, and I turned my head to face my oldest son, smiled at him and kissed him on the cheek.
"We'll figure something Babe".
When Chris walked into the house I looked up at my young son and made the instant decision that I was pulling him out of school.
I didn't know what I was going to do after that, but I figured it out.
Many years later, I can't figure this out.
Today would have been my Seans' 6th wedding anniversary.
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