The dogs were on their double leash that morning, as usual. I don’t use it to keep them from running away, but to stop them from taking off after a cat or from snooping too long at the entrance to one of the sheds or barns along our way. “The straight and narrow!” I often remind them. As if they have any choice. Poor dogs. To be forced onto the virtuous path with no right to brag about making virtuous choices.
Our path is a lovely, sinuous route along the river, which follows its own winding course, with several iron bridges arching across the water. Where the path narrows at the first footbridge, both dogs sank their noses deeply into a patch of foliage. No harm in indulging them, so I let them snuffle about in the green growth as long as they liked. While they were entertained, I entertained myself: Why, I wondered, the straight and the narrow? Why are these particular qualities considered virtuous? The word straight—which seems a natural good for any path, being the shortest distance between two points—is actually a corruption of strait, meaning (wouldn’t you know!) narrow. The narrow and the narrow—double narrow!
The dogs had had enough of whatever bouquet had caught their attention, and on we went, soon reaching the road that bisects the footpath. We crossed the train tracks and the river again, then headed back along a skinny dirt road barely wide enough for a car. My mind returned to narrow. Why would it ever be a good thing? Doesn’t narrow usually mean limited, confining, even small-minded—narrow alleys, narrow minds, narrow margins of error? They describe what to avoid: tight spaces, limited views, high stakes.
And yet, in the phrase the straight and narrow, narrowness is the path of moral clarity, discipline, and righteousness. I remembered that the bridges we’d crossed had guardrails to keep anyone from slipping on the sometimes-slick metal and falling into the river. It was the railing, not the narrowness, that protected you. Yet the narrower the way, the easier it is to focus. So perhaps narrow does keep you from falling into trouble, from wandering too far off course. Narrowness becomes protective—like that railing, or a fence keeping you from a cliff’s edge. It’s not there to trap you; it’s there to keep you alive. Narrow is good because it limits harm.
The dogs exercised their limited freedom again, pulling toward a fenced field on one side of the road. Two horses, a large gray mare and a smaller filly, stood at the fence, as if expecting us. They did not shy from the dogs, who soon lost interest. Not I, however. Two such big, beautiful animals, as quietly unobtrusive as the old chestnut they stood under—marvelous! Inside the fenced area, the grass was nibbled short. Outside, bordering the dirt road, it grew in luscious tufts. I grabbed a handful for the mare, then another for the filly. A year old? Two? I couldn’t tell. Whether or not the horses could count years, they clearly knew the pecking order: when the mare suddenly bared her teeth and shook her head at the filly, the filly wheeled away. “All for you?” I asked. “That’s not virtue!” So I gathered two more bunches to hand out at the same time. The grass smelled fresh in my hands.
A small lean-to stood in the corner of the field, offering shelter from the rain. In this mild climate, that is protection enough, and the animals were lucky to be outside rather than shut up in a barn and paddock. But build a barn and open the gate, and what would these two do? Surely they’d stay put in the open, green pasture, rather than retreat into the safer, warmer barn. And I? If a had a gate and a choice? Which would I choose? The safe paddock and warm barn? Or the pasture, open and green, with sunlight playing over leaves of grass?
But wait, I wondered, what if the narrow way isn’t something we choose, but something we pass through before choice is even possible? If you come into the pasture from the paddock, there is only one path, no need to choose the “right” one. You’re safe and warm inside, but to emerge into the wide pasture of the larger world, you must pass through the narrow gate.
How many such narrow gates do we pass through in our lives? Some minor, some profound; some chosen, some unavoidable. The straight and narrow isn’t just a path we decide to take in adulthood—a sign of maturity or morality. Maybe it’s something we passed through long ago and that set the stage for further, unexpected constrictions. Think of the original narrow gate. Warm safety behind us, a world of air and light ahead. No choice. No righteousness. Just one passageway—from womb to world, from enclosure to exposure.
“Makes you wonder, doesn’t it, doggies?” I tugged gently to get us back to our path.
They had been sniffing the ground happily, left and right, but they lifted their heads for a moment, noses up, as if to say, “Makes you sniff, doesn’t it?” Then they put their noses right back into the grass. Like me—and the horses—they love leaves of grass. The smellier, the better.
