As another storm-chasing season begins, the sky still beckons

I keep hearing blogs are dead, unless they’re so full of searchable content that they’re not. Mine has been quiet for a while, and there are reasons for that.

While I occasionally opine about writing and I love to share my photos, I mostly use the Sky Diary blog as a kind of archive so I can remember and relive my storm chases over the years. But real life often gets in the way of my record-keeping. I still have a bunch of old files on my legacy storm-chasing site that haven’t migrated over here yet. And 2023 – well, I managed to post just one of my Tornado Alley chases with Alethea Kontis from last year DURING last year.

 

Part of the issue is that when you’re chasing, you’re driving. And driving. And driving. And maybe eating subpar snacks and forecasting a little. If I’m lucky, I’ll get a few hours of sleep after dumping all my photo cards each night and backing everything up. It takes forever. And when I get home, I have to catch up with reality all over again.

So on the eve of chasing storms in 2024 — after missing a historic outbreak — I thought it might be time to catch up on my storm reports a bit. I’ll be posting a few fantastic 2023 chases under 2023 in the blog sequence (backdating them). Feel free to browse and see what you might find. The first one is up: a dazzling lightning-producing storm in New Mexico on May 25, 2023.

What have I been doing, if I’m so slow to post my chase photos? One, I have a day job editing books and creating book covers. Two, I’ve thrown almost all of my “extra” energy into writing new mysteries under my pen name and trying to grow the audience for those. Three, hubby and I are occasionally traveling now that the worst of the pandemic is over, and four, I have family obligations that take a bite out of my schedule.

And we have crazy dogs. Did I mention dogs?

Storm chasing has been a long and twisty road. It’s changed. So have I. As life gets more complicated, why do I keep doing it?

Perspective after almost three decades of chasing

I remember a time when I dreamed of integrating storm chasing into every part of my life, of being in the inner circle, of “making the grade” and earning some kind of gold star of recognition. I felt like I had something to prove, I guess. I haven’t fully achieved any of those things, for good reasons, it turns out, one of them being that sometimes those shiny things are worth less than you think.

But I chase. And storms did work their way into much of my life, elevating my photography and inspiring my Storm Seekers Series of novels. Storm chasing is a huge part of my identity still.

Back when I got hooked on chasing, I applied for jobs in Tornado Alley, which would have been a big move for me as a lifetime East Coaster. In the end, I compromised and took a job in Florida, figuring at least there’d be lightning storms. But I still had a “real job” in newspapers, and I wasn’t willing to make the sacrifices some chasers make — going into significant debt, living in their cars. I mean, I am IMPRESSED by that dedication. I just don’t have the constitution to endure the hardships. And there’s so much life to taste, to quote a song. I want to chase storms and do a lot more before my time runs out.

And now I have a life on the East Coast that means I’ll probably never live just a few hours’ drive from targets in the Alley, which means I’m going to continue to miss huge events like last week’s tornadoes unless I can somehow afford to — or desire to — shed a lot of the other things I do.

At this point — 2024 marks my 28th season — I’ve missed way more events than I’ve caught. But I’ve caught some incredible ones.

A hard lesson to learn if you’re really obsessed with storms is that you will NOT see everything. Sometimes you’ll even be on the right storm and not see the tornado, and it hurts. I still sting over some of my misses, but life is short, and you have to decide if you want to balance other priorities with the thrill of chasing.

Caveat: “Thrill” is not a great word to use, because it’s associated with an adrenaline rush, with courting danger, with “zero metering” (getting into a tornado, which I’ll never do intentionally). Adrenaline happens, of course, and so do mistakes, but the thrill for me is capturing nature’s spectacles along with the freedom of roving the country and going wherever the weather is. Seeing old friends is a huge part of chasing for me, too. And if I can capture beautiful structure, I don’t even care that much if I don’t see the tornado.

 

The sky still calls, and so does the art

Video has been totally devalued, so “getting the shot” is more for my satisfaction than for my occasional video sales (I’m not averse to sales, mind you!). And now YouTube has stripped monetization from my videos because I don’t get enough traffic. Not that I ever earned much. So I’m still trying to fund my passion, fund the art – sell photos (you can see some at Stolen Butter Gallery), sell books, and share beautiful things that people like. (You can Buy Me a Coffee with the links on this site if you enjoy my content.)

Some people say content is free, but you have to be able to afford to make it, or the only thing we’ll see is reductive AI iterations of storms and stories. And who wants that? So the struggle goes on.

Given chasing is rarely a fortune-making endeavor, it comes down to: Why do I chase? Still?

The wonder. The satisfaction of nailing a forecast. The exploration. I mentioned the freedom. And photography still drives me when I chase storms. My sensibility has evolved from a journalistic viewpoint to more of an artistic one.

When you’re “running and gunning” with stills and video, there’s extra challenge to framing a meaningful shot. Sometimes you just want to document the moment. And that’s OK. But when an opportunity presents itself to say more, you have to recognize it and take it.

That artistic quest, finding meaning in the moment, will never stop challenging me. And it’s another reason I keep going back to Tornado Alley.

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Keep up with our chases on my Sky Diary page and on social media. Follow me on YouTube, Instagram, and the Funnel Vision page on Facebook.