I finished a photo assignment at a local hospital a couple of nights ago, then met my wife at a nearby shopping mall for a snack and a little walking inside. Afterward, as we headed to our cars in the parking lot, I glanced at the western sky, which until now was under a heavy cloud cover. A small section of the sky appeared to be a boiling mass of pink, similar in appearance to the sky in the movie Independence Day just before the alien ships arrived to destroy the planet.
I joked to my wife that we should hurry home because it appeared that Dekalb just got nuked. We watched the swirling mass grow, then slowly open to reveal pink and gold clouds beyond the portal. Rays of sunlight streamed out of the hole. I shot a few photographs from the parking lot, but having a Home Depot as a foreground wasn't quite cutting it for me. I wrote it off and decided to head home, while my wife drove off to a grocery store to pick up a few items.
I shot a few more pictures of the Home Depot apocalypse, then climbed into my car and headed out of the parking lot. My cell phone rang. My wife had called to tell me that the view was spectacular where she was. I turned west and onto the road she had just taken. She was right -- the hole was now closer, larger and shooting rays of light in a gigantic laser light show. My only problem was finding an unobstructed view.
I turned into a subdivision hoping for a clear shot of the sky over some rooftops. No dice. I gave up again and left the subdivision, turning east to head home. I glanced at the rearview mirror then decided to pull over. I got out and got a couple of shots of the roadway and trees beyond. A police car pulled up and asked if everything was OK. I explained I was getting a few shots of the sunset and Mr. Policeman nodded and drove off. I got another dozen or so shots, all hand-held, before the light faded.
Photographs © 2010 James Jordan.
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