The traveller had been searching for the beginning for so long that he had almost forgotten what he had expected to find.
First he had looked for the first moment.
Then for what came before it.
Then for nothing.
Then for the first cause.
Then for the background.
Then for the first difference.
And each time, the beginning had moved.
Now he had one question left.
What makes possibility possible?
He walked until he came to a garden.
It was the most beautiful garden he had ever seen.
Trees grew beside streams.
Flowers opened beside stones.
Birds moved between branches.
Paths crossed one another in every direction.
At the entrance stood an old gardener.
The traveller approached him.
“Are all these paths here?”
The gardener smiled.
“Of course.”
“Where do they lead?”
“Somewhere.”
The traveller pointed to a path winding between two trees.
“Was that path here yesterday?”
“Yes.”
He pointed to another.
“And that one?”
“Yes.”
“And that?”
“Yes.”
The traveller looked around.
“There must be thousands.”
“More every day.”
“Where do they come from?”
The gardener shrugged.
“They appear.”
The traveller frowned.
“Do you build them?”
“Sometimes.”
“Then who builds the others?”
“The garden.”
The traveller laughed.
“A garden cannot build paths.”
“Why not?”
“Because a path must already be possible before it can be made.”
The gardener looked at him.
“Must it?”
The traveller hesitated.
“A path leads somewhere.”
“Yes.”
“So there must already be somewhere to go.”
“Yes.”
“And therefore the possibility of the path must already exist.”
The gardener smiled.
“You have been thinking about possibility.”
“Yes.”
“Then come with me.”
They entered the garden.
After a while they came to a clearing.
There was no path leading into it.
“How do we get there?” asked the traveller.
“We cannot.”
“Why not?”
“There is no path.”
“But the clearing is there.”
“Yes.”
“Then the path is possible.”
The gardener shook his head.
“It is not yet available.”
The traveller looked puzzled.
“What is the difference?”
The gardener picked up a stone and placed it on the ground.
“This stone can be used as a marker.”
He moved it.
“Now it can be used as a weight.”
He moved it again.
“Now it can be used to hold this branch down.”
The traveller watched.
“The stone did not change.”
“No.”
“But what it can do changed.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because its relations changed.”
The traveller looked at the stone.
He thought of the door.
A door had not been a possibility floating somewhere before there was a wall, an opening, a room, and something that could move through it.
The gardener continued walking.
They came to a stream.
A fallen tree lay across it.
The traveller stepped onto the trunk.
“Now there is a bridge.”
“There is the possibility of crossing.”
“Yes.”
“But yesterday?”
“Yesterday the tree was standing.”
“And then?”
“The storm came.”
The traveller looked at the tree.
“The storm did not create a new world.”
“No.”
“It changed a relation.”
“Yes.”
“And a new possibility became available.”
The gardener smiled.
“You are beginning to see the garden.”
They walked on.
They came to a place where two paths met.
The gardener stopped.
“Yesterday there was only one path here.”
“How can that be?”
“A new path was made this morning.”
“By whom?”
The gardener pointed towards a child sitting nearby.
The child had been carrying stones.
“She moved them.”
The traveller looked at the two paths.
“So the garden now allows a choice that it did not allow yesterday.”
“Yes.”
“And that choice did not exist somewhere waiting to be discovered.”
“No.”
“It became possible when the relations in the garden changed.”
“Yes.”
The traveller stood very still.
He had always imagined possibility as something that came before becoming.
A seed could become a tree because the possibility of a tree was already there.
A building could be constructed because its construction was possible.
A person could learn a language because the possibility of learning already existed.
But perhaps this was only half the story.
The possibility of a particular becoming depended upon the relations that made that becoming available.
The gardener led him deeper into the garden.
They came to a locked gate.
Beyond it was another part of the garden.
“How do we get there?” asked the traveller.
“We cannot.”
“Why?”
“There is no way through.”
“But surely there is a possibility.”
The gardener shook his head.
“Not yet.”
He took a key from his pocket.
He unlocked the gate.
The traveller stepped through.
“And now?”
“Now it is possible.”
The traveller laughed.
“You have changed your answer.”
“No.”
“You have changed the garden.”
“Exactly.”
The traveller looked back at the gate.
The garden had not gained another place.
The place had already been there.
But a new relation had appeared between where they stood and where they could go.
And with that relation, a new possibility had become available.
He began to understand.
Possibility was not necessarily a warehouse filled with things waiting to happen.
It could be something that emerged as relations emerged.
A path became possible when there was somewhere to go and something that could travel.
A conversation became possible when there were speakers capable of responding to one another.
A tool became possible when there was something that could be done with it.
A new form of life became possible when conditions entered into relations that had not previously existed.
The gardener sat beneath a tree.
The traveller sat beside him.
“So possibility has a history.”
“Yes.”
“But not necessarily because some possibilities disappear.”
“No.”
“Because new ones become available.”
“Yes.”
The traveller looked across the garden.
Everywhere he looked, possibilities seemed to be multiplying.
A branch could become shelter.
A stone could become a marker.
A stream could become a boundary.
A path could become a journey.
A meeting place could become a conversation.
A conversation could become an agreement.
An agreement could become a custom.
A custom could become an institution.
And each new relation opened further possibilities.
The garden seemed less like a collection of things than a living web of ways in which things could become otherwise.
The traveller stood.
“Then what was possible before the universe?”
The gardener laughed.
“You have returned to the beginning.”
“Have I?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because you are still imagining possibility as though it existed somewhere before there was anything that could be possible.”
The traveller looked puzzled.
“What else could it mean?”
The gardener picked up a seed.
“Could this seed become a tree?”
“Yes.”
“Could it become a bird?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because it is a seed.”
The gardener nodded.
“And what makes the tree possible?”
“The conditions of the seed.”
“And the soil.”
“Yes.”
“And water.”
“Yes.”
“And light.”
“Yes.”
“And time.”
The traveller paused.
“Then the possibility is not in the seed alone.”
“No.”
“It belongs to the relations.”
“Yes.”
The gardener placed the seed in the earth.
“Possibility is not a thing waiting for the world to catch up with it.”
“What is it, then?”
“A way the world can become otherwise.”
The traveller repeated the words softly.
“A way the world can become otherwise.”
“Yes.”
“And that way depends upon what the world is.”
“And upon what it becomes.”
The traveller looked around the garden.
He saw now that every new relation changed what could happen next.
The garden was continually acquiring possibilities.
Not because it contained a hidden store of futures.
Because it was continually becoming something from which further becoming could occur.
He suddenly understood why the first difference mattered.
A difference allowed distinction.
Distinction allowed relations.
Relations opened possibilities.
Possibilities allowed further relations.
Further relations opened further possibilities.
Perhaps the universe was not best imagined as a thing that appeared at the beginning of everything.
Perhaps it was more like this garden.
A world in which possibilities continually became available.
The traveller looked at the gardener.
“Then perhaps the beginning was not the moment when the first thing appeared.”
“No.”
“Perhaps it was the beginning of a world acquiring the capacity to become otherwise.”
The gardener smiled.
“That is closer.”
“And the first difference mattered because it made further differences possible.”
“Yes.”
“And the first relation mattered because it made further relations possible.”
“Yes.”
“And then possibility itself could begin to unfold.”
The gardener stood.
“Now you are ready to leave the garden.”
“Why?”
“Because you are looking for a beginning again.”
The traveller laughed.
“Where should I go?”
The gardener pointed towards a path.
The traveller looked at it.
“Was that path there before?”
The gardener smiled.
“No.”
The traveller stared.
“But I can see it.”
“Yes.”
“When did it appear?”
The gardener shrugged.
“When the garden made it possible.”
The traveller stepped onto the path.
He walked for a while.
Then he stopped.
Behind him was the garden.
Ahead of him was a road that had not existed when he entered.
He turned around.
The gardener was gone.
The traveller looked at the road.
For the first time, he did not ask where it had begun.
He asked what it made possible.
And as he walked, another thought followed him.
Perhaps the deepest beginning was not the appearance of something from nothing.
Nor the transition from one state to another.
Nor the arrival of a first cause.
Perhaps it was the moment when a world acquired a new way of becoming.
A beginning was not necessarily:
nothing → something.
Nor:
one state → another.
Perhaps it was:
a world → a world capable of becoming otherwise.
The traveller walked on.
And behind every step, the path changed.
Ahead of every step, another path became possible.
He smiled.
Perhaps possibility did not come first after all.
Perhaps possibility began when there was finally—
something that could be otherwise.