Today I'm grateful for balconies

Is there anything more human than wanting to be higher than someone else? Since time immemorial Kings have commissioned bloody battles and enacted baffling laws to seek out or protect some higher ground. Some say it makes it easier to defend their empire but that’s a bit too convenient for my liking. I think they do it because it makes them feel like a big man.
Isn’t that feeling of superiority the reason we all seek out the higher ground? It’s the reason people stand on their tippy-toes, wear high heels, loom over passengers seated on trams and get ‘lifts’ in their shoes.

And if I look deep inside it’s one of the main reasons I choose apartments with balconies, I admit I like people looking up to me. And even though my neocortex knows it’s completely bogus, in my weaker moments my limbic system still thinks that because I’m higher than someone else I’m beating them in life. There’s a power imbalance that comes with a bit of extra height and I uncontroversially posit it harks back to pre-Gunpowder Revolution days in the 15th Century when size actually mattered.
On a related note we all feel somewhat vulnerable when someone’s above us and it’s not unreasonable to think gravity plays a role. How much easier is it to pick someone off with a water bomb from up on high, you just put it out there and let sweet lady G take care of the rest.

and here we are taking advice from a man who stared at apples all day ¯_(ツ)_/¯

So if we set aside deep-seated insecurity and Ol “Apples” Newton’s gravity for a minute why else do people seem to like balconies?

Because you get to connect with the vast, unpredictable outside world from a controlled, safe space. It’s basically the same premise but a much weaker version of virtual reality, VR Lite™. You get a glimpse of the limitless wonderland of another world but when it gets too loud or windy (or in the case of VR, bowel-vacatingly scary), you can just step back inside/take the goggles off.

And don’t even think about trying to come at me with that “how about a patio?” or “I’ve got a pergola?” horseshit. Patios and pergolas are not even in the same category as balconies, and this is why:

First of all, they’re on the ground so there’s no inflated sense of self-esteem and you’re not beating the Joneses unless the Joneses are underground cave-dwellers, in which case they’re already better than you and your shitty patio. And while technically you can still throw water bombs at them I personally wouldn’t recommend fucking with cave-dwellers at all.

Secondly, you’re not exactly coming into contact with a vast cornucopia of unearthly surprises when you have a patio, it’s just your backyard. You can’t see shit. It’s basically another room of your house.

I’m grateful for balconies because they make me feel like a big man without me having to do anything.