When the Sky Performs for an Audience of One
“Look at those clouds,” I say to no one, because no one else has noticed the impossible architecture forming above our heads—towering columns of vapor that would make cathedral builders weep with envy.
The loneliness isn’t in watching sky alone. It’s in being surrounded by people who’ve forgotten to look up.
Everyone walks with eyes fixed on phones, problems, pavement. I walk with neck craned toward phenomena that happen once and never repeat—this exact arrangement of light and moisture, this particular conversation between sun and storm, this temporary sculpture that dissolves even as I’m noticing it.
“Ki dekchho upore?” Arash asks when he catches me sky-gazing. What are you looking at up there? And I try to translate wonder into words a child can understand, pointing at color gradations that have no names, cloud formations that tell stories about wind patterns and atmospheric pressure.
But mostly I watch alone, accumulating observations that feel meaningful but have no social currency. Who cares that morning light hits differently in December than November? Who wants to hear about the way monsoon clouds build like slow-motion explosions, or how sunset colors predict tomorrow’s weather?
The sky performs daily miracles for audiences of one—me, occasionally, when I remember to notice.
There’s particular sadness in witnessing beauty that goes unwitnessed. The spectacular sunrise that happens while everyone sleeps. The rainbow that appears for exactly three minutes while everyone’s inside. The meteor shower that decorates empty streets.
I become accidental archivist of celestial events, collecting atmospheric memories that die with me because no one else was paying attention. The loneliness of being the only witness to wonders that deserve audiences.
“Always looking at clouds,” Happy teases gently, not understanding that clouds are never just clouds—they’re weather predictions, light filters, temporary art installations that remake themselves constantly. Each sky is different. Each moment offers new combinations of elements that have never existed before and will never exist again.
But explaining this makes me sound eccentric, obsessed with irrelevant details. So I watch quietly, accumulating solitary wonder, becoming stranger to people who’ve learned not to notice the daily miracle happening over their heads.
Maybe this is what makes some people sky-watchers: not just appreciation for beauty, but willingness to be alone with it, to find sufficient meaning in atmospheric phenomena to compensate for social isolation that comes from caring about things others consider background noise.
The sky changes. I’m the only one who notices. Tomorrow it will change again. I’ll notice again, alone again, accumulating another day of solitary wonder in a world too distracted to look up.
