Some people are so stuck in the mundane that they only look up to roll their eyes.
Even the English expression "head in the clouds" reflects our discomfort with sky-gazing. Being "grounded" and "level-headed," well, those are virtues.
Laura Candler, a 23-year-old graduate of the University of the South in Sewanee, Tenn., has seen her share of eye-rolling in the last 18 months. Candler spent a year studying dramatic cloud formations around the world using a $28,000 grant from the Watson Foundation Fellowship, a legacy of IBM founder Thomas J. Watson. The fellowships offer promising college students a year of exploration and travel.
Candler is a Georgia native who lives in St. Elmo. Her dream was to witness the world's most remarkable clouds. She flew a glider plane through the churning Morning Glory clouds off the coast of Australia. She trailed flying-saucer shaped lenticular formations in New Zealand and stalked the elusive polar stratospheric clouds in Sweden.
Response to her around-the-world cloud-watching journey ranged from envy to derision, Candler said.
"Most people didn't believe me," she said of explaining her mission to people around the world. "Reaction ranged from disbelief to disdain. Some people were inspired."
"... Our culture is a very busy culture," she explained. "There's nothing that necessitates us looking up."
The Watson family set up the grants to encourage dreamers, Candler said. The grants, awarded to as many as 50 college students nationwide each year, release young adults to follow their passions, even if the travels have no particular vocational value. Other Watson fellows have lived in the world's most notorious slums and studied the effects of long, polar nights, Candler said.
Candler is from Sharpsburg, Ga., where she grew up watching thunderstorms roll across the Piedmont Plateau. It was a family tradition to run to a hillside near her home to storm-watch, she said.
"Clouds remind me of home," she said. "They've always shaped the way I see the place I live."
In Australia, Candler joined a band of glider-plane pilots who "ride" the giant Morning Glory cloud formations like surfers ride ocean waves. When the atmospherics are just right, a huge cloud bank charges across the sky, while appearing to churn in backward loops, she said.
When she landed her maiden glider flight, Candler said she was embraced and kissed by other glider pilots who welcomed her to the Morning Glory club.
"It was like we had gone through this wild dream together and come out on the other side," she said.
In New Zealand, she hiked along hills and ridges to find the clouds that form when the winds form eddies of moisture, creating the appearance of huge, flying saucers.
In Sweden, Candler hung out with research scientists who study some of the most elusive cloud formations in the world, the polar stratospheric clouds that shimmer with mother-of-pearl luminescence in the twilight.
One day, why serving as watchdog in subzero weather on a rooftop, Candler saw the clouds forming and excitedly summoned the scientists. Sometimes the phenomenon only happens one day a year, she said.
"They are silvery, with pale blues and pinks," she said. "They look like they've been smeared across the sky. It almost looks like a being. It looks otherworldly."
The Watson Foundation embraces the idea that young, passionate dreamers like Miss Candler are worth an investment, if for no other reason than to fire their imaginations.
It's a spark, frankly, that can lead to a wildfire of inspiration.
I heard about Candler from a co-worker who had heard her speak to a local group, and, in turn, excitedly put a sticky note about her on my computer screen.
I spoke to Candler for 30 minutes and wrote the column you are reading. Some of you will repeat the story to others, perhaps out of envy, perhaps out of derision. It doesn't matter.
In 100 directions, emotions are stirred. Ideas are flowing. People are asking themselves: So what's MY passion?
And then suddenly, inexplicably, things start looking up.