Doe Season

Blood and Initiation

    There's a contrast in this story between her inner dialogue and that of the rest of the hunting party. This is where we see an initial distinction between her as a young woman, and the others speaking the same language, male. This being said, there is a distinction between male and female. We see even in the way that her father addresses her as "honeybun" (page 457). Though this is a coming-of-age story, this story is more than a rite of passage into adulthood. This is story about a rite of passage into womanhood. What is interesting is the way in which she finds her identity. She seems a little gender confused in the beginning because she refers to herself as Andy, as opposed to Andrea. This may be her father's doing, but she is desperate for his approval. We see this when Mac is tasked with rounding up firewood and Andrea cuts in and says, "I'll do it" (page 460). We also know that she doesn't want to shoot the deer, but she does, for her father's approval. At this point, the wound is made. The wound may be symbolic of the wound in her heart that has been created in this rite of passage. The deer's wound and heart mimics her own in that she feels alive, yet wounded: "...she had found the does heart warm and beating. She cupped it gently in her hand . Alive, she marveled. Alive (page 466)." This is where the blood is mentioned, "...her hand pulled free, followed by a steaming rush of blood, more blood than she ever could have imagined."The symbolism of the blood can be interpreted both as a parallel to menstruation, a girl becoming a woman; and to the bleeding associated with intercourse, a symbol of the loss of innocence all-so-common in a coming-of-age story. Although not age appropriate in the physical sense, it is important to understand that this is a parallel to her emotional coming-of-age. When the deer dies, she was re-birthed in the sense that the very event that could have initiated Mac, initiated her, just in a separate way. A sign of this separation is her running: "Andy was running from them, back to the field and across, scattering the crows who cawed and circled angrily (page 467)." The initiation is definitive when "she will no longer be called Andy (page 467)."