Throughout much of history, many women have spent a significant amount of their lives in search of their own voice and ways to represent themselves and their lifestyles. Some of the ways they have been able to convey their story's is through literature, folk tales and other forms of story telling. Unfortunately, a lot of individuals were unable to fully express themselves due to strong social implications regarding a woman's role in society and other cultural expectations. In Zora Neale Hurston's novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston disregarded the typical gender conventions of her time when she created Janie Mae Crawford, the main character in her book. Over the course of the novel, Janie embarks on a journey, both physically and spiritually where she searches for a sense of personal identity, independence and love in the rural south. Janie refuses to adopt the role of the traditional black woman of this time, ignoring the wishes of her grandmother and going against all odds, Janie attempts to fulfill her dreams and aspirations.
The first defining moment of Janie's life comes to her at the young age of sixteen. During this time in her life, she is living with her grandmother in West Florida and spends many of the hot summer afternoons under a pear tree in her grandmother's backyard. On one particular occasion, Janie "saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom" (Hurston 11). "So this was a marriage!" (Hurston 11). Janie believed that she would one day find someone that she would be able to depend on for survival. Janie expects that her marriage will resemble the union that the flower shares with the bee. The flower relies on the bee for pollination and the perpetuation of it's species, while the bee relies on the flower for food and nourishment. It is this experience that Janie will remember for the rest of her life, with the pear tree representing the awakening of the woman inside her and setting a standard of sexual and emotional fulfillment for the rest of her life.
