Claustrophobia

Usually claustrophobia is associated with little tiny spaces, like closets, small rooms, WC on the airplanes. But there are other types of claustrophobia’s, one of them is opposite of the small places, it is when people feel claustrophobic in large spaces, it just happens for these places to be a bit less “open”. I’ve heard stories of people who grew up in New Mexico, went to college to NC and felt absolutely claustrophobic.  If you been to both states then you’ll know what I’m talking about. And there is another type of claustrophobia, not space related, I call it “organizational” or “authority” claustrophobia. It is a bit complicated to describe it. All I can say is that I think I have that type of claustrophobia, that is why many years ago I left Soviet Union and pretty much all of my professional career work in consulting industry, which is to me one of the great forms of modern day capitalism.

Anyway, why am I talking about all this? Well, the following image got me thinking about it. Being free. Open space. No restrains. No other reason.

American Landscape

I love how you can see for miles and miles on the American West, there is no ending to it. On a clear day like this you can see so far away; we were about thirty miles away from the Mt Hood and you can see it like it is right in your back yard. Nothing like this ever happens on the East coast. Most times we have too much humidity here for such clear views.

While visiting Oregon one of the biggest surprises for me was how quickly the landscape and weather changes from West to East. In a matter of 15-20 miles it changes from lush-plush forest area to pretty much dry sun burned steppes. It was my first visit to Oregon and first time we drove from Portland to The Dalles, I really could not believe my eyes to such a drastic change in environment.