Why lengthen your stride when you can shorten the road?
From The Beginning Viewed from the End, one of 296 sayings written by John Sarris over thirty years.
From Alfred’s journal
A man came along the north path this morning at a pace I would call punishing, arms going, head down, and he passed the gap in the hedge where the path bends back on itself. I have watched him do this four mornings running. The gap saves him maybe two hundred feet, and I only know it is there because I have the roof of the whole walk. For years I took the long way around the Whitmore yard myself, every day, flying the fence line because that was the line, until one November I crossed the middle of it after a hawk and found the far elm was nowhere near as far as I had made it. Why lengthen your stride when you can shorten the road. Though he may know about the gap and like the bend; I have not asked him, and he does not stop.
He reads what you tell him and writes a page of his journal back, with a few of these chosen for you. It costs nothing and asks for nothing.
Have it on something
More like it
- Knowledge leaves a well-worn trail, but the path to wisdom is unmarked.
- Dream of the stars, but dream too of a road that takes you there.
- It’s not your path if your feet never touch it.
- The road will change you, if you’re on the right road.
- Even a closed door has a knob you could turn to see what happens.
- If you’re willing to take a long enough road, you can get anywhere.