Bottling the Sky

It was a perfect morning to go hunting. One of those bright spring days that rained down, bathing everything in a bright radiance. The clouds hung there, lazily in the air. Plump from the morning dew that had escaped the clutches of the grass and made it into the sky.

He loved their curves. Their whisps. How they could blend together, crashing into one another, merging into something even more beautiful. He had found them early enough that they were still pure - clean from the exhaust and dirt stirred up by the morning commuted. They looked like giant puffs of cotton, ready to be plucked. He just wanted to touch them - become encased by them. Somehow manage to grab hold of one and float away on it - lost in its haze.

His room was filled with them. Glass jars and boxes littered his shelves, bookcases, and desk. Whenever his friends came over, they always asked him what they were for. Never seeming to grasp that they were filled with his collection. What he spent every day on. Hours of his week devoted to.

And what a collection it was.

There were jars filled with churning storms, cascading down the edges of the glass - dark and brooding. Rainstorms that were caught in an endless loop. There was one for every season - including the thin, elongated clouds that were only able to be caught in autumn or the large bulbous towers that littered the sky in the summer months, much like those that hung above him today. When the sun was high in the sky, unbearable to others, he'd escape to his room, holding between his hands any of the jars that held a winter storm - feeling the cold through the glass enclosure. If he dared, he could even open the lid and empty out a small bit of snow on the floor, shuffling his bare feet through it.

Everyday, as he stumbled down the stairs and into the kitchen he was greeted by a new jar - sitting on the table, next to his breakfast. His mother knew how much he enjoyed his hobby and only wanted to make him happy. No two jars were ever the same. Some looked old, dumbed down and numb by time and age. Smooth to the touch. Others appeared to be from a foreign land, blown by the most delicate of lungs. Occasionally one bore radical designs - corners that jutted out, colors that were one of a kind. He never knew how his mother found them. Where she journeyed to in order to purchase them. Who she knew.

But every morning, he was thankful.

Because of her, his collection always grew.

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