Being Born Into Adulthood, cont.____________________

Laurey is finally born from the dream
only to see Jud standing over her,
so she realizes the real world is coming to resemble
the demonic realm of the dream.

She is now trapped into going to the social with Jud.
On the wagon, he assaults her and she whips the horses
so they are trapped on the wagon
as the horses run out of control,
which may be a disguised depiction
of being wildly carried along
in a tumultuous passage down the birth canal.

Laurey manages to temporarily escape Jud,
but she is then threatened by him.
Yearning for safety, she falls into the protective arms of Curly
who she had previously resisted.
As she kisses him, her wall of denial breaks down
and, in a state of delight, she wants to kiss repeatedly,
which may be an image of the relief and joy of birth.

It is clear that she has had no choice
but to be born into sexual adulthood.
Her comfortable containment has turned into entrapment
because, in an effort to escape being born as an adult,
she has turned to a force against life.
Now it is impossible to turn back.
She can be born as Jud's fallen bride
or she can recognize her true desires
and be born as a woman with Curly,
who is her only escape.

A wedding and celebration ensues, which is another image
of the joy and deliverance of being born,
followed by a fertility ritual
in which the newlyweds stand on the haystack
of a recent harvest
as their friends throw doll-like likenesses of children
up at them,
which emphasizes that they will soon harvest
a new generation, themselves.
Now, it seems that Laurey has finally become an adult.

But it turns out she has a false sense of safety
and the process of birth isn't complete.
When Jud sets fire to the haystack,
Laurey, and now Curly, are trapped.

Fortunately, this time, with Curly by her side,
there is someplace to escape to.
She leaps from the burning haystack,
which may be another image
of traveling down the birth canal,
and Curly jumps on, and kills, Jud.
They have now both taken the plunge into adulthood,
a place where serious things happen
and death is a presence that can't be denied.

The lesson from Aunt Eller
solidifies Laurey's gains
and turns those gains into a conscious awareness
of how an adult life is to be lived.

The process of being trapped, struggling and escaping,
and feeling joy and relief, is repeated in the trial.
Finally, the movie offers its final and most complete
sense of good feeling, which begins
with the finding of Curly's innocence
and leads to the last scene in which the community
bids farewell to the euphoric honeymooners
who have been delivered into their new life.

Of course, there is no way to prove that all of this
is made up of disguised depictions of birth.
After all, the progression we see in the movie
from safety to dangerous entrapment
to confrontation and escape and resolution
is a characteristic of conflict and change
and need not express the imagery of birth,
which is just one kind of change.

But the birth-like dream sequence shown earlier,
in which Laurey's double
runs down the hallway and fenced-in path;
runs through the opening into the tavern;
and finds herself on the stairs with a sudden drop

are unmistakable signs that we are looking at
a disguised depiction of a child in the birth canal
trying to be born.

In the first scene in the movie
we are born from the fertile cornfields
into the nursery of the undeveloped Oklahoma territory.
In the last scene, our identification with the characters
makes it possible for us to be born into the young adulthood
of the characters and the emerging state of Oklahoma.

Although we have followed only three couples
on this path, they clearly represent a generation.
It is society itself that has been depicted
as it renews itself, guiding its young people
so they can take their place in the chain of life.