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Edna\'s first step from her condition of sleep to a phase of dreaming can be seen in chapter seven, when she walks to the beach with Mme. Ratignolle and starts talking about her childhood memories and her marriage to Léonce. She tells Adèle about \'a summer day in Kentucky, of a meadow that seemed as big as the ocean\' when she \'threw out her arms as if swimming\' (Awakening, 60). In her dreaming phase Edna realizes the freedom that can be achieved through swimming, using this metaphor to describe her childhood, before she was married and when she is still \"free\".
In this sequence of the story the narrator stops addressing the protagonist as Mrs. Pontellier, but rather calls her \"Edna\", thus giving her subjectivity. In her dreaming phase, Edna tries to gain independence in various ways. When the day of Léonce\'s departure to New York draws near, \'Edna scurries about the house in a new kind of agitation - guilty, we suspect, not so much over the fact of remaining as over her premonition about the temptations of independence\' (Delbanco, 97).
In this phase of independence, through the absence of her husband, Edna gradually realizes her individuality and her power. She even decides to move out of the house she shares with Léonce, for she develops a sense of ownership and pecuniary independence.
When she sends her children to their grandmother, she can experience total freedom and independence. She steps out of her \"expected role\" of a mother, thus expressing her disapproval of the belief that women are supposed to sacrifice everything for their children.
Again, Edna\'s phase of dreaming is reflected by characters and symbols throughout the novel. The male character representing Edna\'s dreaming phase is Robert. Even though it is Robert who \"awakens\" sexual desires in Edna and thus is the reason for her change, he does not reflect the awakening phase. The reader soon realizes that, if Edna\'s relationship with Robert had been successful, she would again have been forced into the role of a \"mother-woman\", restricted by social conventions. Edna even expresses this when she meets Robert at the Café:
[...] you never consider for a moment what I think, or how I feel your neglect and indifference. I suppose this is what you would call unwomanly; but I have got into a habit of expressing myself. It doesn\'t matter to me, and you may think me unwomanly if you like. (Awakening, 165)
Robert\'s views on women do not differ from that of most men at this time. He considers wives to be the possession of their husbands. This becomes obvious when he tells Edna, \'Oh! I was demented, dreaming of wild, impossible things, recalling men who had set their wives free, we have heard of such things\' (Awakening,167). In contrast to her sleeping phase, Edna disagrees openly with these views and expresses her disapproval:
You have been a very, very foolish boy, wasting your time dreaming of impossible things when you speak of Mr. Pontellier setting me free! I am no longer one of Mr. Pontellier\'s possessions to dispose or not. I give myself where I choose. If he were to say, \"Here, Robert, take her and be happy; she is yours,\" I should laugh at both of you. (Awakening, p167)
Robert finally refuses to wait for Edna and stay together with her, leaving a note that says \'I love you. Good-bye - because I love you\'. The reader can see his dependency on social conventions; he loves Edna and therefore he has to leave her. He knows the consequences their relationship would have and prefers to go the safe way.
Edna\'s learning to swim is an important sign of her first awakening, that is an awakening from a sleeping to a dreaming phase. Though she has the ability to swim, she is still full of fears. First \'she did shout for joy, as with a sweeping stroke or two she lifted her body to the surface of the water\' and \'grew daring and reckless, overestimating her strength. She wanted to swim far out, where no woman had swum before\' (Awakening, 73). But as soon as she is in relatively far distance from the shore, she gets a feeling of panic:
Once she turned and looked toward the shore, toward the people she had left there. She had not gone any great distance - that is, what would have been a great distance for an experienced swimmer. But to her unaccustomed vision the stretch of water behind her assumed the aspect of a barrier which her unaided strength would never be able to overcome. A quick vision of death smote her soul, and for a second of time appalled and enfeebled her senses.
(Awakening, 74)
Here Edna fears the unknown, and she is eager to return to the \"safe shore\", which at the same time is the world of restrictions and social conventions. She is not fully awakened yet. She experiences freedom and independence but she is not yet ready for it.
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