wandering

[won-der-ing]

adjective

1. moving from place to place without a fixed plan; roaming; rambling.

   Crowds of wandering tourists crossed the square.

2. having no permanent residence; nomadic.

   They were historically a wandering people, moving seasonally through the area.

3. meandering; winding.

   They followed a wandering path down the mountain.

noun

1. an aimless roving about; leisurely traveling from place to place.

   For our honeymoon we had a period of delightful wandering through Italy.

2. Usually wanderings.

   1. aimless travels; meanderings.

      Her wanderings took her all over the world.

   2. disordered thoughts or utterances; incoherencies.

      mental wanderings;

      the wanderings of delirium.

3. seemingly aimless or random movement from one place to another by a person with a mental or cognitive disability or impairment.

   Wandering by Alzheimer’s patients is a problem in nursing homes.

Other Word Forms

• wanderingly adverb
• wanderingness noun
• unwandering adjective
• unwanderingly adverb

Word History and Origins

Origin of wandering¹

First recorded before 1000; Middle English (noun, adjective), Old English wandrigende (adjective); wander ( def. ), -ing ² ( def. ), -ing ¹ ( def. )

Example Sentences

I’ve treated elderly patients who had been found wandering the streets, lying in their own excrement or simply dehydrated because of gaps in care.

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We met each other again in the lush trees of Griffith Park, wandering off the trails and into beds of fallen leaves and twisted branches.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

The handling of this plot device, with the canny veteran Reid wandering in and out of the drama like an informational time bomb, is a little clumsy.

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Every big cheese in the subprime mortgage market would be there, with a name tag, and wandering around The Venetian hotel.

Read more on Literature

The work in question is a "maqāma" -- an Arabic literary form that often features a wandering "trickster."

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Related Words

• meandering 
• nomadic 
• roving