Chapter+6+pg+78-104+-+The+Present

=__**Summary Of Chapter 6: "Present" **__=


In Dillard’s 6th chapter of __Pilgrim at Tinker Creek__, entitled “Present”, she attempts to focus on the world around her at the present time. Throughout the entire book thus far, Dillard has been dwelling on past occurrences and in recognition of this she attempts to focus on her current surroundings and situation. In doing so, Dillard really emphasizes the impossibility of looking at anything around us without applying it towards the past and future. In her description of the present, Dillard shows that every time you think you are in the present, it has slipped away and has already become part of the past. She writes, “This is it, I think, this is it, right now, the present, this empty gas station, here, this western wind, this tang of coffee on the tongue, and I am patting the puppy, I am watching the mountain. And the second I verbalize this awareness in my brain, I cease to see the mountain or feel the puppy” (80).

While acknowledging the difficulty of “catching” the present, Dillard constantly tries to bring herself, and us, back to her present by writing, “I am sitting under a sycamore by Tinker Creek,” which is referenced in the book multiple times. However, every time she mentions this, it brings her back to swirling world that surrounds her. Dillard, like all of us, is still searching for meaning in everything that happens. She brings us back to the tomcat, the giant water bug, the mocking bird, the sharks, starlings, the coot, the spider, mantis egg cases, the Polyphemus moth, and the snake, all of these things that she has spent so much time knowing, studying, revealing. She recognizes that most of these characters of her life are now dead and gone, yet she still sits by her creek, under the giant sycamore.

Dillard finally realizes, near the end of the chapter “//“Ho, if you are thirsty, come down to the water; ho, if you are hungry, come and sit and eat.”// This is the present, at last. I can pat the puppy any time I want. This is the now, this flickering broken light, this air that the wind of the future presses down my throat, pumping me buoyant and giddy with praise” (103). Everything that she searches for, the present, the questions, the answers, will come to her eventually. She acknowledges that you cannot search for “the present”, but instead, “You wait for it, empty-handed, and you are filled” (104).

ALLUSIONS **   “Shadows lope along the mountain’s rumpled flanks; they elongate like root tips, like lobes of spilling water” (Dillard 79) “as you look at a still-beautiful face belonging to a person who was once your lover in another country years ago” (Dillard 80) “The present is an invisible electron” (Dillard 80) “Living is moving; time is a live creek” “Present is a freely given canvas” "The creek rests the eye, a haven, a breast" (Dillard 87) "The past inserts a finger into a slit in the skin of the present, and pulls" (Dillard 89). "Live water heals memories" (Dillard 101).
 * 

Annie Dillard mentions "innocence" a lot in the chapter "The Present". The following is a comparison of //her// definition versus the dictionary's: “What I call innocence is the spirit’s unself-conscious state at any moment of pure devotion to any object. It is at once a receptiveness and total concentration” (Dillard 83) knowledge or understanding; harmlessness "The courage of children and beasts is a function of innocence" (Dillard 91). "When we lose our innocence-when we start feeling the weight of the atmosphere and learn that there's death in the pot-we take leave of our senses" (Dillard 91). Allusions: § // “Stephen Graham startled me by describing this same gift in his antique and elegant book, // The Gentle Art of Tramping. //He wrote, “And as you sit on the hillside, or lie prone under the trees of the forest, or sprawl wet-legged on the shingly beach of a mountain stream, the great door, that does not look like a door, opens.// (Dillard 81)" § // “scandal of particularity” // (81). "1994: A materialism [...] was supposed to be what science favoured: and the ‘scandal of particularity’, God becoming incarnate in Christ in human history, was indeed regarded as a scandal — that is, absurd — by contemporary intellectuals. — Richard Swinburne, //Reason and the Christian Religion// (Oxford 1994, p. 1) 2006: Reformed theologians look to the scandal of particularity as a way of naming how the unknowable God is known to us. — Cynthia L Rigby, ‘Scandalous Presence’, //Feminist and Womanist Essays in Reformed Dogmatics// (John Knox 2006, p. 59). (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/scandal_of_particularity)" § // “Goethe’s Faust risks all if he should cry to the moment, the // augenblick, “Verweile doch!” //“Last Forever!” Who hasn’t prayed that prayer?// (Dillard 84)//” "Faust -// Faust or Faustus ([|Latin] for "auspicious" or "lucky") is the protagonist of a classic [|German legend] who makes a [|pact with the Devil] in exchange for knowledge. (Wikipedia)//" –//I believe she is referring to “Faust” by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe § // “Speaking of the development of the // papier colleen //late Cubism, Picasso said, “We tried to get rid of trompe-l’oeil to find a trompe-l’esprit.” Trompe-l’esprit! I don’t know why the world didn’t latch on to the phrase. (Dillard 84)"//  Trompe l’oeil translates to “cheat the eye” and Trompe l’esprit translates to “cheat the spirit” (www.freetranslation.com). § // “Thomas Merton wrote, in a light passage in one of his Gethsemane journals: “Suggested emendation in the Lord’s Prayer: Take out ‘Thy Kindom come’ and substitute ‘Give us time!’ // // ” But time is the one thing we have been given, and we have been given to time. // (Dillard 86) // ” // Thomas Merton was a "20th century [|Catholic] writer. A [|Trappist] monk of the [|Abbey of Gethsemani], in the [|U.S. state] of [|Kentucky]. (www.Wikipedia.com)" For further reading, check out __The Seven Storey Mountain__ by Thomas Merton. § // “My friend Rosanne Coggeshall, the poet, says that “sycamore” is the most intrinsically beautiful word in English” // (Dillard 87) //. // For further reading, I suggest “Rivets” by Rosanne Coggeshall. § // “I want to come at the subject of the present by showing how consciousness dashes and ambles around the labyrinth tracks of the mind, returning again and again, however briefly, to the senses: “If there were but one erect and solid standing tree in the woods, all creatures would go to rub against it and make sure of their footing. // (Dillard 88) // ." // This is from __A week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers__ by Henry David Thoreau. § // “Xexes, I read, “halted his unwieldly army for days that he might contemplate to his satisfaction” the beauty of a single sycamore” (88), and “He had is form wrought upon a medal of gold to help him remember it the rest of his life” // (Dillard 89)"  are references to stories told about Xerxes and his adoration of the sycamore tree. They may be exerpts from “Serse” (Xerxes) which is a play by George Frideric Handel. § // “But it goes without saying, doesn’t it, Xerxes that no gold medal worn around your neck will bring back the glad hour, keep those lights kindles so long as you live, forever present? Pascal saw it. He grabbed pen and paper; he managed to scrawl the one word, FEU; he wore that scrap of paper sewn in his shirt the rest of his life. I don’t know what Pascal saw. I saw a cedar. Xerxes saw a sycamore” // (Dillard 89) //. // Again, Dillard references Xerxes story, but in addition- she is talking about Pascal. This may possible be a reference to Blaise Pascal, a French mathematician, physicist, and religious philosopher. According to [|www.theopedia.com], “Following a mystical experience in late 1654, he left mathematics and physics and devoted himself to reflection and writing about philosophy and theology. His two most famous works date from this period: the Lettres provinciales and the Pensées. However, he had suffered from ill-health throughout his life and his new interests were ended by his early death two months after his 39th birthday.” § // “I have never understood why so many mystics of all creeds experience the presence of God on mountaintops. Aren’t they afraid of being blown away? God said to Moses on Sinai that even the priests, who have access to the Lord, must hallow themselves, for fear that the Lord may break out against them” // (Dillard 90). Recommended reading, __The Bible__. § // “In the open, anything might happen. Dorothy Dunnett, the great medievalist, states categorically: “There is no reply, in clear terrain, to an archer in cover” (91). // "Dorothy Dunnett is best known for her two superb series of historical fiction - The Lymond Chronicles, and The House of Niccolo - set in the 15th and 16th centuries and ranging all over Europe and the Mediterranean while being anchored in Scotland, and for King Hereafter , the 11th century story of Earl Thorfinn of Orkney whom Dorothy believed was also King Macbeth. She was also a portrait painter and sculptress. (http://www.dorothydunnett.co.uk/)" § // “We vertebrates are living dangerously, and we vertebrates are positively piteous, like so many peeled trees. This oft was thought, but ne’er so well expressed as by Pliny, who writes of nature, “To all the rest, given she hath sufficient to clad them everyone according to their kind: as namely, shells, cods, hard hides, pricks, shags, bristles, hair, down feathers, quills, scales, and fleeces of wool. The very trunks and stems of trees and plants, she hath defended with bark and rind, yea and the same sometimes double, against the injuries both of heat and cold: man alone, poor wretch, she hath laid all naked upon the bare earth, even on his birthday, to cry and wraule presently from the very first hour that he is born into the world” (93). // Dillard is probably referring to "Gaius Plinius Secundus, better known as Pliny the Elder, who was an ancient [|author], [|naturalist] or [|natural philosopher] and naval and military commander of some importance who wrote [|//Naturalis Historia//] . He is known for his saying //"True glory consists in doing what deserves to be written; in writing what deserves to be read"//. ([|www.wikipedia.com])" § // “Arthur Koestler wrote, “In his review of the literature on the psychological present Woodrow found that its maximum span is estimated to lie between 2.3 and 12 seconds” (94). // "Arthur Koestler was a Hungarian born British novelist, journalist, and critic, best known for his novel "Darkness at Noon" (1940), which reflects his break with the Communist Party, and his ideological rebirth. ([])" § // “The present of my consciousness is itself a mystery which is also always just rounding a bend like a floating branch borne by a flood. Where am I? But I’m not. “I will overturn, overturn, overturn, it: and it shall be no more…” (95). // This is a passage from the  [|King James Bible] ,   Ezekiel 21:27.  VOCABULARY ** accuracy and in great detail knowledge or understanding; harmlessness smaller proportion of clay chitinous, and other structural material; the cytoplasm and nucleus other quantity that can be translated into electric energy, as sound waves own country. of a current of falling water reproducible with great accuracy and in great detail
 * Innocence ** – freedom from sin or moral wrong; simplicity; absence of guile or cunning; lack of
 * Brome - ** grass
 * Tremulous – ** (of things) vibratory, shaking, or quivering
 * Hummocks ** – low mound or ridge of earth
 * Incursions ** – the act of entering another’s territory or domain
 * Stagnant ** – inactive, sluggish, or dull
 * Prerogative ** – right or privilege
 * Buoyant ** – tends to float
 * Subterranean ** – operating below the surface of the earth, operating out of sight or secretly
 * Ichthyology ** – branch of zoology dealing with fishes
 * Lancet ** – small sharp instrument used for making incisions
 * Apogee ** – highest or most distant point
 * Eidetic ** – pertaining to visual imagery vividly experienced and readily reproducible with great
 * Emendation ** – a correction or change
 * Osage ** – member of a North American Indian people
 * Filament ** – fine thread or threadlike structure
 * Labyrinthine ** – complicated ; tortuous
 * Fusillade ** – general discharge or outpouring of anything
 * Rapt ** – deeply engrossed or absorbed
 * Piteous ** – evoking or deserving pity
 * Obelisk ** – a tapering, four-sided shaft of stone usually monolithic and having a pyramidal apex
 * Lappets ** – a decorative flap or loose fold on a garment or headdress
 * Innocence ** – freedom from sin or moral wrong; simplicity; absence of guile or cunning; lack of
 * Entomologist ** – the branch of zoology dealing with insects
 * Regalia ** – rich, fancy, or dressy clothing
 * Burgeoning ** – to put forth new buds, leaves, or greenery; sprout
 * Hazarded ** – to venture (something)
 * Loam ** – a rich, friable soul containing a relatively equal mixture of sand and silt and a somewhat
 * Gilt ** – gold in color; golden
 * Protoplasm ** – the colloidal and liquid substance of which cells are formed, excluding horny,
 * Oscillograph ** – a device for recording the wave=forms of changing currents, voltages, or any
 * Vouchsafed ** – to allow or permit, as by favor or graciousness: They vouchsafed his return to his
 * Undifferentiated ** – having no special structure of function; primitive; embryonic
 * Augenblick ** – moment
 * Verweile doch ** – linger yet
 * Lancet ** – a small surgical instrument, usually sharp-pointed and two-edged, for making small incisions, opening abscesses
 * Trompe! ** – a device formerly used for inducing a blast of air upon the hearth of a forge by means
 * Eidetic ** – of, pertaining to, or constituting visual imagery vividly experienced and readily
 * Mottled ** – spotted or blotched in coloring
 * Primeval ** – of or pertaining to the first age or ages, esp. of the world: primeval forms of life
 * Definitions taken from www.dictionary.com