I have lived through a lot of extreme weather. I remember in Oklahoma when I was a little girl. The sky would get very dark. Almost green. Very quiet. Everyone would be looking for dark funnels. In the desert of West Texas, I can remember struggling to walk across campus to a college class in a sand storm. I remember a flash flood on Maui where the dry gullies filled up and over flowed.

We have very dark winter days here at the 45th parallel north. Sometimes with rain. Sometimes not.

Today is different. It’s just eerie. The sky was red. Then smoke dark. Now dark yellow. Everything looks sepia. Lots of wind. Branches cracking. Leaves still green blowing down. I’m indoors with all the windows closed and my air filtration system on the job. It looks like it should be cold out there but it’s hot. I’m keeping everything charged in case a tree limp hits in my neighborhood.

At 8 a.m. this morning, the smoke from the not-very distant fires was so thick that it was dark as night. I felt like the apocalypse has occurred and I had been lucky enough to sleep through it. Everyone is staying indoors. Eerie is the only word for it. I walked out back with the dogs and came right back in. They looked very puzzled and my eyes started to water. I can’t seem to take an accurate picture of the sky. My camera keeps “auto-correcting” it.

I wish we could auto-correct this whole year.