Size Matters

I used to think this was a really big country. I used to think Denver was close to the West coast. I used to think the Appalachians were real mountains, and I used to think that all orange moose were only about 6-7 feet tall at the shoulders. I'm not so sure any more. All this back and forth, North and South, has changed my perception some, and we all know that perception is reality - everything else is mere illusion.

For example, I used to think Texas was big, and I'm still pretty convinced about that. If you drive from Houston to Los Angeles, the half way point is El Paso. And, if you drive from Dallas to Denver, the half way point is Amarillo, and you still have another hour or so left to drive in Texas after that. On the other hand, at one point Rhode Island is only 25 miles wide; that's about Detroit to Ann Arbor - three, maybe four exits on the interstate.

Then there's Montana. If you drive across the state on I-90 and I-94, it's just over 700 miles, which is pretty close to the same as Detroit to Atlanta - only without so many people and fast food restaurants along the way.  However, Montana has other issues - Clinton, Montana holds the Testicle Festival every fall (no shit, you can look it up on the Internet, although I wouldn't recommend it), but I don't think anyone really lives there - it's all just smoke and mirrors.

The lesson here so far is: Texas is big with lots of people and Montana is big and is inhabited almost entirely by cardboard cut-outs and buffalo. I'm pretty sure the buffalo are real, though.

There are a number of states that have really big features even if they don't have a whole lot else going on - Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming come to mind. It's hard to drive through these states and not be thoroughly whelmed by the real mountains, mesas and buttes that seem to go on forever. In terms of sheer rugged beauty it's very difficult to top these three states. Also, there is a very large amount of nothing in Oregon.

Then, so as not to be remiss, there is California, which is not really so much a state as it is a foreign country. They play by their own set of rules out there, which they make up as they go along, and then they wonder why the rest of the country doesn't understand them or feel their pain. It really is a beautiful state, it's just that it's also very bizarre. And, it's farther from Los Angeles to San Francisco than it is from Cleveland to Chicago (in more ways than can be measured by miles alone).

By the way, as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, Denver is no where near the West coast, even though you have to drive west from St. Louis nearly forever just to get there. It takes longer to drive from Denver to Seattle than it does to drive from Boston to Columbus. 

So, I guess the bottom line here is that this is still a pretty big country, it's just not big everywhere - it's all relative. And, size really does matter, unless you're Rhode Island.