Vineland Obs

Wow! Can this be the first Vineland observation?!

Ok, I suggested this on the Pynchon List a couple of years ago, but it didn't take. I love Vineland passionately, and utterly refute any suggestions that it's Pyncon Ordinaire. But, that very first sentence....

"Later than usual one summer morning in 1984, Zoyd Wheeler drifted awake in sunlight through a creeping fig that hung in the window, with a squadron of blue jays stomping around on the roof."

...has always struck me as odd. That '...in sunlight through a creeping fig...' is a strange, slightly awkward construction, is it not? And we know how much care P takes with his opening lines, so it's even stranger that he opens the book with this, dare I say it, vaguely ungrammatical turn of phrase? Of course, this being Pynchon, the mind recoils from such thoughts, which just leads to more pondering.....