21st-Century American Fiction.: Ree as a Caretaker

Monday, December 2, 2019

Ree as a Caretaker

In Winter’s Bone, by Daniel Woodrell, Ree Dolly is forced into becoming the caretaker of the family when her father leaves Ree in charge of her two younger brothers and her ailing mom. Even though she is only sixteen, Ree thrives as a caretaker and uses her role to teach her younger siblings to become more self-sufficient.

Ree is introduced as the primary caretaker when she helps her brothers get ready for school. Ree is having to constantly motivate her youngest brother, Harold, to put on smelly socks so he and his brother, Sonny, can catch the bus. The weather outside is turning cold and dreary, so Ree reminds her brothers to grab their bags and stocking caps to prepare them for the day. Ree takes care of her brothers because she does not want to see them become “dead to wonder by age twelve, dulled to life, empty of kindness, boiling with mean” (8). Ree’s actions show that she sacrifices her own education to take care of the house which allows her brothers to get an education. After that education at school, Ree takes time to teach life lessons to her brothers including cooking and shooting.

Ree cooks a multitude of things from deer stew to onions and potatoes to squirrels, but throughout the book she constantly forces her brothers to pay attention to how she is cooking the food. Her brothers do not completely grasp the intricacies of cooking at first, cooking a monstrous creation they call Basketti, but Ree impresses these lessons constantly in hopes that they will show proficiency in cooking. By allowing them to make mistakes and helping them to learn from those mistakes, Ree is teaching her siblings self-sufficiency while also taking care of her siblings. She also uses this method when she teaches them how to shoot a gun. Ree makes Harold and Sonny shoot safely and properly until they are comfortable handling guns. Ree has two intentions behind learning this skill. First, she wants her brothers to be able to defend themselves. Second, she wants them to be able to feed themselves by hunting wild game. She eventually leads them on a hunting trip where they kill enough squirrels to make breakfast; she teaches them how to clean a squirrel and, in the process, fills their stomachs, which highlights her abilities as a caretaker.

Ree flashes her abilities as a caretaker towards the end of the novel when Merab Thump answers the door. Ree understands the gravity of the situation right as the boys come to the door behind her. To keep them from involving themselves in her drama, Ree tells them to “get back in the house [and] keep out of sight” (180). By keeping them out of the situation, Ree protects them from potential backlash by the Thumps. Overall, Ree cares for her siblings by getting them ready for school at the expense of her own education, showing them how to cook and hunt, and protecting them from harm.

2 comments:

Payton BearDecember 3, 2019 at 7:53 AM
I think this post affirms some of the other posts about gender roles, specifically in the way that Ree is both a mother and father figure to her younger brothers. Caretaker is an excellent word to describe her relationship with her brothers; she does the duties of both parents, avoiding the label as only a mother or father figure. This combination is seen in Ree’s attire when it is stated that she “nearly always wore a dress or a skirt, but with combat boots” (Woodrell 20).

Ree also finds herself as a caretaker to Gail’s baby in some ways, allowing Gail and Ned to live with her. Ree assumes the gender role that best fits whatever situation she is in, so she uses a more masculine role to complement Gail’s more traditional feminine role in being a mother to Ned. Ree’s conformity to either masculine or feminine roles may be a result of her upbringing, as in the Ozarks, a nuclear family may be the only way she knows how to act as a caretaker. Ree’s role as a caretaker was most evident to me throughout the novel, and it seems clear based on the other blog posts that this was a central theme to the story.
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Jim AdkinsDecember 3, 2019 at 12:35 PM
One of the best ways to determine the true character of a person is to see how they respond when faced with hardship or tragedy. Ree Dolly is thrust into an impossible situation with the disappearance of her father and the potential of losing her house. Throughout her attempt to find her father she always made time for her family. This post captivates this theme. It successfully establishes Ree as the primary caretaker to the household.
Ree’s mother Connie is bedridden and severely ill. Ree has to give her mom her medication and bathes her. Without Ree taking care of her mother, she would not survive. Ree understands this and becomes the primary caretaker.
She convinces her brothers to wear smelly socks (7). She teaches her brothers how to cook by making them watch her cook. When she received the venison from Sonya she told her brothers, “I’ll be fixin’ deer stew tonight. That sound good? Both of you need to watch how I make it” (19). Not only does she teach her brothers common household skills, she teaches them how to defend themselves by teaching them how to shoot telling them, “Now’s when you boys start learnin’ how to shoot guns at what needs shootin’” (78).
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