Yes, magic is a great way to describe it. Sometimes it's delightful and benevolent magic, while other times it's more like a trickster's curse.

For me, there came a point when making Free nixen do what I want became easier than making macOS not do what I didn't want. Returning to Linux/*BSD from my decade long sabbatical to macOS, I've been delighted by the things that have changed, but even more delighted by some of the things that haven't.