By Andrea Winkjer Collin, Editor, North Dakota Horizons
One of the greatest pleasures I have traveling during the summer is the entertainment the skies provides. It's like Mother Nature has placed us in a large amphitheater and puts on a unique show everytime we head down the highway.
Don Such is a Fargo photographer who had several of his pictures published in some very early issues of North Dakota Horizons. I know his type, he's the kind who always has a camera at his side.
He did on July 16 when he was in Bismarck for the Golden Wedding celebration for former Fargo neighbors, Tom and Diane Schmitz, at Holy Spirit Cathedral. Following the evening's mass, Don relates, "when we came out we discovered this tremendous thunderhead developing over the city. I wasn't going to let this scene slip by, so I hotfooted it right over to the capitol to take this shot. I picked up the flag shot on the way over."
On their way back to Fargo, Don says, "we drove back to Fargo by back roads on Sunday and were dismayed at all the wet fields, late crops and number of acres that had not been touched since spring melt. The high temperature and high humidity made for an interesting photo effect. As I got out of the air-conditioned car to take a picture of an abandoned farmstead, the lens fogged over and gave me an ethereal effect I wasn't counting on!
"We drove through off-again, on-again low clouds and fog all the way to Fargo only to learn later that we were followed by large hail and at least one funnel touchdown."
Thanks, Don, for reminding us of the constant entertainment, and sometimes destruction, of summer weather on the Northern Plains. I will be on the road this weekend, and will have my camera ready as well. Unlike Don's, however, my photos never quite capture the magnificance of what my eyes are seeing.
It doesn't mean I can't keep on trying!
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