Place, space and landscape

April 1st, 2024

Those concepts — place, space and landscape — are very important for the way I think and feel. Important as three separate ideas, but I also think that in unison as a conglomeration, they are the most defining of my search for understanding in life. I cannot yet consider them together, since my ability to think and analyze is not fully ready for that task. For now, I consider them next to each other, in a way as complementary ideas, but still as separate entities.

The biggest problem with considering them all at once is the limitedness of human sight — one that I have and is also prevalent in the rest of humankind. Our eyes, and all the optical and neuron connections we have, work fine for us in everyday life. I mean — they evolved that way and we are doing fine with what we have. For myself, I can see a lot more than the average person. I am able to notice details and connections in everything that I don't think is common for others. But that is not enough for me. I still think I don't see what I want in the way I want and I don't see that which would be necessary for me to form a mind map of what I want. My vantage point is wrong. And the problem is that I cannot change it. I see what is in front of me. I can make connections between what my sight records from different angles, but I lack the ability to see from the above. I can imagine the view from the top, or spend time looking at the maps and satellite imagery to try to achieve a fuller understanding. That is only a pitiful way to try to embrace the totality that is needed (for me) to fully see every place in space as presented within the landscape. Maybe I am asking for too much. Maybe I should be grateful for what I already have. Maybe — but I will keep looking for ways to just glimpse that totality. I know I need it to form a required (by me) understanding of the world.