I heard the song “I Can See Clearly Now” recently and a line struck me differently than it has before.
“Look all around, there’s nothing but blue skies”
Blue skies. Happiness. Synonyms.
This happened to be on a cloudy day.
I thought how interesting it is that my perspective has sometimes shifted on the notion that blue, cloudless skies are generally optimal. Living in The Valley of the Sun—Phoenix metro—for nearly 20 years has slowly caused that shift. Days without clouds are common certain parts of the year. Days with a few clouds but not the kind that enshroud the sun are probably the most common. According to the American Association of State Climatologists, we have sunshine an average of 86% of the time.
Honestly, that’s lower than I expected.
Every summer, there are many days when we wish for cloud cover. Or celebrate the rare day when we have cloud cover. Whether it’s raining or not, relief from the summer sun is welcome any time in the long summers here.
So blue skies have their place, and days like we’ve had recently where the temperatures are comfortable with a light breeze, blue skies are lovely. Sometimes, though, clouds can be nicer than none.