New Alchemy

Afternoon Presence

The mountain ranges all around Lake Tahoe feel its influence no matter what the prevailing wind.  When warm air rises from the sun warmed water and then rolls up the slopes of the surrounding peaks in the heat of the afternoon, large thunderheads form that surge upwards to branch out in all directions in space. Depending upon the angle of the sun and the prevailing wind first one peak then another give rise to the strongly forming thunderheads throughout the afternoon. When walking in the vicinity of the lake it is interesting to try to tell which peak is sending up the thunderheads on any given day. The location of the cloud gives information about wind direction in relation to the lake in a kind of primeval script. The rapidly ascending air creates fantastic forms that morph rapidly into elemental shapes.

The picture shows a strongly growing animal like cloud ranging off of a peak that stands to the southeast of Lake Tahoe. The red slopes of the volcanic peak are part of an outcropping of volcanoes that are just to the south of the largely granitic slopes on the northern and western sides of the lake. In this image a wind moving from the west/southwest is streaming across the lake that is directly behind the darkened central peak in the picture. The peak is darkened by the immense shadow of the growing cloud. The warm moist air coming up the slope behind the peak is streaming off of the peak and stretching into the space high above the mountain. The desert is to the right and soon this cloud will lift off of the peak and float out over Nevada while off of the peak in the distance we can see the beginning of another race of elemental cloud beings.  These remarkable kinds of afternoon presences are often seen in the vicinity of Lake Tahoe. They occur in ever changing positions during the day or the week. In certain seasons there is a daily parade of gnomes, fairies, wizards, sprites and angels that stream off of the lake and make their way out over the desert to eventually come down as beneficial rains somewhere in Kansas.