Volume 7 · The Long Afternoon · Essay 15
Audi Et Alteram Partem Principle
The Audi Et Alteram Partem principle is old wine in a labelled bottle. The label is new; the wine has kept many households steady.
Applied daily, it changes less than you hope and more than you expect. That is how principles work — unglamorous, cumulative, and visible only in photographs taken years apart.
It is worth keeping in your pocket not because it is always right, but because it is always available. A tool you carry beats a perfect tool you left at home.
At the bus stand in a small town, goodbyes are long and arrivals are loud. Both are correct. A life is measured by how seriously it takes each.
In the end, life asks only whether we were awake while it happened. Print it on a card if you like. Better: print it on a habit.