not at those factical occasions which tum our attention to something already presented, but rather at the ontological meaning of the fact that it can thus be turned.
When something cannot be used—when, for instance, a tool definitely refuses to work—it can be conspicuous only in and for dealings in which something is manipulated. Even by the sharpest and most persevering1 'perception' and 'representation' of Things, one can never discover anything [355] like the damaging of a tool. If we are to encounter anything unmanageable, the handling must be of such a sort that it can be disturbed. But what does this signify ontologically? The making-present which awaits and retains, gets held up with regard to its absorption in relationships of involvement, and it gets held up by what will exhibit itself afterwards as damage. The making-present, which awaits the "towards-which" with equal primordiality, is held fast alongside the equipment which has been used, and it is held fast in such a manner, indeed, that the "towards-which" and the "in-order-to" are now encountered explicitly for the first time. On the other hand, the only way in which the making-present itself can meet up with anything unsuitable, is by already operating in such a way as to retain awaitingly that which has an involvement in something. To say that making-present gets 'held up' is to say that in its unity with the awaiting which retains, it diverts itself into itself more and more, and is thus constitutive for the 'inspecting' ["Nachsehen"], testing, and eliminating of the disturbance. If concernful dealings were merely a sequence of 'Experiences' running their course 'in time', however intimately these might be 'associated', it would still be ontologically impossible to let any conspicuous unusable equipment be encountered. Letting something be involved must, as such, be grounded in the ecstatical unity of the making-present which awaits and retains, whatever we have made accessible in dealing with contexts of equipment.2
And how is it possible to 'ascertain' what is missing [Fehlendem]—that is to say, un-ready-to-hand, not just ready-to-hand in an unmanageable way? That which is un-ready-to-hand is discovered circumspectively when we miss it [im Vermissen]. The 'affirmation' that something is not present-at-hand, is founded upon our missing it; and both our missing it and our affirmation have their own existential presuppositions. Such missing is by no means a not-making-present [Nichtgegenwartigen]; it is
1 'anhaltendste'. This is the first of several compounds of the verb 'halten' ('to hold') which appear in this and the following paragraphs. Others are 'behalten' ('retain' in the sense of holding in one's memory), 'aufhalten' ('hold up' in the sense of delaying or bringing to a halt), 'festhalten' ('hold fast').
2 'Das Bewendenlassen muss als solches, was immer es auch an Zeugzusammenhängen umgänglich zugänglich macht, in der ekstatischen Einheit des gewärtigen-behaltenden Gegenwärtigens gründen.'