Bobsie Skelton Skelton 1
Phil Chamberlin, M.A.
ENC 1102: Composition II
10 November, 2014 Transitioning
A rite of passage marks a significant transition in a person’s life. A person is transitioning from one stage to another, as from childhood to adolescence and then to adulthood. In America different celebrations are considered a rite of passage like: Baptism, High School Graduation, College Graduation, Engagement, Marriage and many more. Each culture has their own rite of passages that are celebrated at different times of a person’s life.
In Sharon Olds “Rite of Passage” and Judith Ortiz Cafer’s “Quinceanera,” the reader is given a view of transitioning from childhood to adulthood, from the eyes of a boy’s mother and the eyes of a young girl.
A girl’s entrance into womanhood and eligibility for marriage is celebrated in the Latin community with her Quinceanera. Traditionally, it is celebrated on a girl’s fifteenth birthday and a very exciting and anticipated event.
In this poem, the reader gets the impression that the girl sees this transition into womanhood more as a burden than a celebratory event. She had to put away her dolls in a chest she will carry with her when she marries. By having to put away her dolls, it symbolizes the end of her childhood and the dolls don’t come out of the chest until she can give them to her own daughter. The dolls become a memory of her childhood. She has to start wearing a satin slip under her skirt now, another sign of maturity. It is not proper for anyone to see through her skirt or dress to her thighs. She has to wash her own clothes and soiled sheets from this day on. She wakes up at night with growing pains. She feels shameful about having a period. In the last two lines