Perspective is everything. Where you’re standing when you look at something, how far away you are from the object you view, whether you are above or below a scene all contribute to how your senses process what you see.
Is it small? Does it seem bigger than you thought? What are those little match box cars and ant-like people doing WAY DOWN THERE when you look from the top of a high hill back to a scene below?
Recently we visited Multnomah Falls outside Portland, Oregon. Arriving, you get off the bus and receive your first sensory input: the pounding sound of water.
Your second sensory input is feeling the mist blasting off the rocks, whipping into you as you wrap your rain slicker tight. Then you look up, and go “WHOA, am I really going to walk up there?”
Yes. That’s the goal. It’s 1.2 miles from the tourist house and parking lot down below.
When you look straight up at a massive waterfall, you think to yourself, “There is no way I can hike up there.” All you see is the verticality of the water. Straight up.
The path doesn’t go linearly, of course. It winds left, then turns back right, again and again, slowly weaving you towards the top. Like any road paved through mountainous terrain, the human must work their way upwards bit by bit rather than ascending directly (probably a lesson in that sentence somewhere).
Don’t look down or you’ll get scared. Or you’ll lose balance. You envision yourself toppling like a tall tree and pinwheeling through eternity to the bottom.
Looking up, all you see is more hard work. Huff, puff. Sweat. Breathe in, breathe out (a nod towards “Karate Kid” and Mr. Miyagi). Don’t think about how much more is left. There are 11 switchbacks. You’ve hit three. You want to turn back.
At some point, you cross a threshold in your heart/mind that tells you you’ll make the top. You’ll be able to say you did it, and LOOK DOWN on the world. Change your view. See things differently.
The water rushes like a freight train at the top. Whipping through the final gully and slashing its way, perhaps even leaping to its journey into nothingness and the rocks that rest below. You can barely hear the sound is so loud.
The view from above changes you in subtle ways. Objects move slower. Your eyes focus on the oddities that distance provides – two people playing with their dogs in slow motion; a bus moving like molasses to navigate a turn; a boat on the far side of the Columbia River edging its way against the current, whether fishing or exploring it doesn’t matter.
Time slows. Your mind stills. You breathe in the moment. Life is good.
The view from above affords you an opportunity to step away from the instantaneous world in which we live, and step back to consider nature, the formation of rocks, how water carves terrain over hundreds of years. You can’t stand there forever.
Walking down,
Is it small? Does it seem bigger than you thought? What are those little match box cars and ant-like people doing WAY DOWN THERE when you look from the top of a high hill back to a scene below?
Recently we visited Multnomah Falls outside Portland, Oregon. Arriving, you get off the bus and receive your first sensory input: the pounding sound of water.
Your second sensory input is feeling the mist blasting off the rocks, whipping into you as you wrap your rain slicker tight. Then you look up, and go “WHOA, am I really going to walk up there?”
Yes. That’s the goal. It’s 1.2 miles from the tourist house and parking lot down below.
When you look straight up at a massive waterfall, you think to yourself, “There is no way I can hike up there.” All you see is the verticality of the water. Straight up.
The path doesn’t go linearly, of course. It winds left, then turns back right, again and again, slowly weaving you towards the top. Like any road paved through mountainous terrain, the human must work their way upwards bit by bit rather than ascending directly (probably a lesson in that sentence somewhere).
Don’t look down or you’ll get scared. Or you’ll lose balance. You envision yourself toppling like a tall tree and pinwheeling through eternity to the bottom.
Looking up, all you see is more hard work. Huff, puff. Sweat. Breathe in, breathe out (a nod towards “Karate Kid” and Mr. Miyagi). Don’t think about how much more is left. There are 11 switchbacks. You’ve hit three. You want to turn back.
At some point, you cross a threshold in your heart/mind that tells you you’ll make the top. You’ll be able to say you did it, and LOOK DOWN on the world. Change your view. See things differently.
The water rushes like a freight train at the top. Whipping through the final gully and slashing its way, perhaps even leaping to its journey into nothingness and the rocks that rest below. You can barely hear the sound is so loud.
The view from above changes you in subtle ways. Objects move slower. Your eyes focus on the oddities that distance provides – two people playing with their dogs in slow motion; a bus moving like molasses to navigate a turn; a boat on the far side of the Columbia River edging its way against the current, whether fishing or exploring it doesn’t matter.
Time slows. Your mind stills. You breathe in the moment. Life is good.
The view from above affords you an opportunity to step away from the instantaneous world in which we live, and step back to consider nature, the formation of rocks, how water carves terrain over hundreds of years. You can’t stand there forever.
Walking down,