Becky Oskin’s piece in livescience explains how this stunning image of the elusive red lightning called sprites was taken:
Sprites last less than a second as they dance on the tops of thunderstorms. Many viewers say the clusters of charged particles look like jellyfish — big, red balls with tendrils that reach down into theclouds
. But red sprites take many shapes, from crowns to carrots, and researchers still don’t why. Because few sprites are seen from the ground, thanks to obscuring storms, scientists are hunting them from the air.
Graduate student Jason Ahrns captured stunning images of spritesduring several flights over the Midwest this summer aboard the National Center for Atmospheric Research’s Gulfstream V research plane. Ahrns is part of a sprite-hunting team from University of Alaska, Fairbanks, the U.S. Air Force Academy and Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colo. [See Ahrns’ Stunning Images of Sprites]
I will forever be grateful I was introduced to the utility and beauty of hand crafted products early in life - from the symbols and motifs sewn onto the coarse linen fabric of Croatian traditional wear to the colorful Kilim carpets that decorated the parquet floors in my grandmother's living room.
I treasure the memories of my grandfather teaching me how to protect myself against the "evil eye," the smell of the flower stalls in the open air market where my grandmother bought produce early every morning for the day’s meals and the summers spent at my great grandmother's where the village wags would come to gossip over thick, black Turkish coffee in her cool stone-floored kitchen.
Someone noted that "For all of us that want to move forward, there are a very few that want to keep the old methods of production, traditions and crafts alive." I am a fellow traveler with those who value the old traditions and folk wisdom. I believe the knowledge they possess can contribute significantly to our efforts to build a more sustainable world - one that values the individual over the corporation, conservation over growth and happiness over wealth.
The Village Market 