wandering

1. 1
   adjective

   Moving from place to place rather than staying settled in one location.

   The wandering tribe followed the herds across the open plains.

   Wandering minstrels once carried news and songs between distant towns.

   Similarnomadic, itinerant, roving, traveling

   Oppositesettled, sedentary

   Note

   Built straight from wander plus -ing, the adjective names a way of life more than a single outing: a wandering monk, a wandering minstrel. It sorts things into a kind rather than measuring a degree, so it does not take more or most. A monk is wandering or settled, not more wandering than another. It sits before the noun, where it does its classifying.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle of wander.

   He spent the evening wandering the old streets of the city.

   Wandering through unfamiliar woods, they soon lost the trail.

   Note

   One spelling does three jobs for the verb. It forms the progressive (her mind was wandering), opens a participle clause (wandering through unfamiliar woods), and works as a gerund naming the activity (wandering suits him). It carries every sense of wander, from a drifting mind to straying from one's course. Compare the adjective: a wandering monk classifies the monk, while he was wandering reports what he did.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The act of traveling without a planned route; roaming freely.

   A summer of wandering taught him to travel light and trust strangers.

   Her wandering across the continent filled several notebooks with sketches.

   Similarroaming, travel, roving, rambling

4. 4
   noununcountable

   The drifting of the mind into aimless, unfocused thought.

   The long sermon invited a pleasant wandering of the mind.

   Her constant wandering during study time worried her teachers.

   Similardaydreaming, distraction, reverie

   Oppositeconcentration, focus, attention

5. 5
   noununcountable

   A straying away from an intended or desired course.

   Years of moral wandering finally gave way to a steadier life.

   The coach warned that any wandering from the strategy would cost them the match.

   Similardeviation, departure, straying, drift

6. 6
   noununcountable

   An irregular or involuntary turning of the eyes from their normal position.

   A constant wandering of the eyes made it hard for him to hold a steady gaze.

   The optometrist recorded the wandering she observed during the exam.

   Similardrift, deviation

7. 7
   adjective

   Of an organ: abnormally able to move out of its usual position within the body.

   A wandering kidney may descend noticeably when the patient is upright.

   Doctors sometimes secure a wandering organ surgically to prevent complications.

   Similarfloating

   Note

   Medicine fastens the adjective to an organ's name: a wandering kidney, a wandering liver. Nothing travels on its own here. The organ is loose in its place, held less firmly than it should be by its supporting ligaments. Unlike the roaming sense, it attaches to anatomy rather than to people, and it works as a fixed clinical label, not a degree: an organ is wandering or it is not.

8. 8
   noununcountableplural

   Confused or rambling speech caused by a clouded or delirious mind.

   The patient's wandering grew worse as the fever climbed through the night.

   In his final hours, a feverish wandering took hold of his speech.

   Similardelirium, raving, rambling, incoherence

   Oppositelucidity, coherence

   Note

   This sense lives mostly in the plural. One speaks of a patient's wanderings, the rambling talk of fever or delirium, more often than of a single wandering. The plural fits, because such speech drifts from one subject to the next. It shares its picture with aimless thought, but here the drift is spoken aloud and signals illness, so it belongs to the sickroom rather than to daydreaming.

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