“She ran… , her nose pressed against the glass” Are the actions simultaneous or consecutive?

Question

>She ran towards the display, her nose pressed against the glass.My friend and I don't understand the same thing when reading this sentence, and neither of us can explain why. To me, it doesn't make sense. The meaning I get is: She ran towards the display with her nose pressed against the glass. My friend says it's one action after the other, basically: She ran towards the display, and pressed her nose against the glass. - Does anybody know which one of us is right? And why? - What does this sentence mean, grammatically? I have some wild theories of my own, with independent and dependent clauses, and different subjects, and... yeah, wild theories...

Answer 1

The sentence is saying she ran towards the display with her nose pressed against the glass, both actions happening simultaneously.

If she were to have run towards the display then press her nose against the glass there would either be a third action, making the comma into an indicator of a list of actions, or the writer would explicitly say she did one then the other. The comma is being used to separate an independant and dependant clause, both of which are taking place at the same time. This is a common way of adding imagery or context into writing so readers will have a more detailed story.