The Usless Tunnel

Though the tunnel itself was almost meaningless as symbolic in "Through the tunnel", the boy himself and the struggle with training and going through itself is very symbolic. In the beginning of the story, Jerry is going to a family beach with his mom. Though he is a only child and at the age of 11, he is very dependent of his mother and almost is childish in his curiosity with the more dangerous other beach. When visiting it, he encounters older boys swimming there, and desperately tries to hang with them and get their attention, which he fails at and cries about it. Then he discovers the tunnel that the boys were swimming through. He tries holding his breath and training to swim through it, while doing this he becomes more and more independent from his mother. At the end of the story, he barely manages to swim through, and has finally accomplished what he trained for. He sees the older boys on the beach, but doesn't want to be around them. This is very symbolic because it shows Jerry becoming of age. From a boy who needs his mother for security and shelter, he becomes almost a man when he finally swims through the tunnel, which was the journey of him becoming a man.