Scarlet's Last Essay

Scarlet Caruso
English 9
Hamilton Salsich
5/27/09

Revisiting Memories:
An Essay on William Wordsworth’s Tintern Abbey and My Life

How would you feel if you came back to a place that was once so important to you after five years of not seeing it? Would you look back in anger at all the moments it made you upset or would you think of all the happy memories that took place there? William Wordsworth and I would think about how much we’ve done since we’ve seen our place. We would look back on our places and think of all the memories created in this small place in this huge world.

Wordsworth, over-looking Tintern Abbey, thinks about all the things he’s done since seeing this place. (PARTICIPLE) He looks back on when he last visited and finds it strange that he has not seen his special place in so long. Wordsworth, amazed by the passing of time, says, “Five years have past; five summers, with the length of five long winters!” William Wordsworth thinks of all he has done since seeing this beautiful place. “Through a long absence,” he finds that he has done so much in this place as well. He has thought deeply, appreciated fully at Tintern Abbey and will never forget the memories. He has experienced, “hours of weariness, sensations sweet, felt in the blood, and felt along the heart.” Wordsworth has done so much in this small oasis (FAST) that maybe it’s more than he’s done in the entire world.

If I were to come back to Pine Point School in 5 years I would wonder where the time has gone. I would wonder how so much has happened since I left one of the most influential places in my life. I would look back on Graduation and say, "Was that really five whole years ago?" I would ponder the feelings I had on the day I departed and think about the things I have done after I left the place I love. The place I would go to first would be in the very middle of the boy's lacrosse field. I would sit there and think of all the amazing things that I had done in this very spot. I had cried there, laughed there, fought there, made-up there. (PARALLELISM) It's funny that I have done more things in that three- foot spot than I have done anywhere else in the world. If I were to come back to Pine Point in 5 years I would sit down in one of my favorite places in the whole wide world and wonder, "Where has the time gone??"

Seeing your favorite place for the first time in five years could be a disorienting experience but if you look at it right it’s a wonderful time to reflect. It could be a time to think about time itself. William Wordsworth finds that, “through a long absence,” you can remember all the wonderful things you did there and the memories that taught you some important lessons. An old place can be a fresh reminder of how we learn and how time passes so incredibly quickly.