The Zigzag Experience

A straight line to the top is not what we’re built for. That’s why the zigzag path was invented. The extra effort of a longer walk is still much smaller than that of maintaining a steep climb.

I’m grateful for zigzags. And yet I always curse them halfway. Their functional rationality is disheartening. They keep the end out of sight. There’s always a zig beyond a zag, and another zag beyond … The mind that enjoys its hiker’s freedom of thinking of nothing in particular, taking in what meets the eye, becomes a rickety calculator, unable to hold a number until the next turn … was it 7 or 8?

The end often comes by stealth. And up there the zigzag experience is forgotten. It never occurred.