The Giant Awakens

 

The Giant Awakens, a cumulonimbus cloud formation over the Sandias, Albuquerque, NM - filtered cellphone photo - 2025, DS.

"According to the legend passed down from the Quinnipiacs, a wise man cast a sleeping spell on Hobbomock and stopped his destructive rampage. He gave him plenty of sleep-inducing oysters to eat, and the giant fell to the ground on his back, where he remains to this day, still sleeping.

But someday, the story goes, the sleep spell will wear off, and Hobbomock will awaken, hungry once more."

- Regardless of how destructive the giant is described in this excerpt of text (found here), the Sleeping Giants were primarily the good guys in Native American tales. In a similar Ute tale the Giant saves the People from an ogre and, in his honor his body is surrounded by rattlesnakes which are there to protect his remains... in case he returns.

Meanwhile, Hobbomock is in reality the steward of Nature's entities - be they plants or animals - and it's only when the People disrespect his kingdom will he become a menacing figure.

***

The Giant Awakens - detail

It's monsoon season in New Mexico. It rains at least twice a day... and this is good for several reasons. One reason is that, between sudden downpours, the sky transforms into something spectacular.

This post features one cloud formation that was so bizarre, my cellphone could not capture it. Whatever I witnessed that Sunday evening hardly resembled what my device recorded. What I saw was a gigantic, ark-like cloud (visually) butting up against a nearby tree. The camera, however, saw the sequence of images found below the jump (with their time & date stamps).

(continued below the jump...)

The first (filtered) image (with detail) above, which is also the first image in the sequence below, appears like a gigantic face peering with one eye over the Sandias. I did not see this on the screen when I shot it. As for the  unfiltered frames, I don't why the lighting is so weird.

Intriguingly, The Giant Awakens, particularly in the case of mountain formations across the USA and Canada - and specifically the "Sleeping Giants" - recalls several Native American tales, two of which are featured in the quote section.

Sunday, May 25, 7:48 PM

Sunday, May 25, 7:50 PM

Sunday, May 25, 7:53 PM

For an art-related thought experiment about cloud anomalies, see the latest Trans-D post, Flying North for the Summer.

For a whole gallery of anomalous clouds see this amazing page.

Fun fact: Did you know that a cumulonimbus cloud - very often a massive thunderhead - can behave like a vacuum and can suck entities (including humans) for miles into its depths? Read about the strange experience of paraglider Ewa Wiśnierska.