The House of the Spirits
Novel: The House of the Spirits
Author: Isabel Allende
Grandma: Clara del Valle
Salient Grandma Trait: Cohesion
As you can see from above, this article is based on a book. Yes, I know that it was made into a movie. And sure, the movie stars three-time Academy Award winning national treasure, Mary Louise Streep, and 90’s “It” girl/klepto, Winona Ryder. But when the only actors even remotely close to source material ethnicity are the extras, you know you have a whitewashing problem. Read the book. Skip the movie.
The House of the Spirits, or if you are fortunate enough to be able to read it in its original Spanish, La Casa de los Espiritus, is a multi-generational novel following the rise and fall of a family in an unnamed South American country (hint: it’s Chile). The novel opens when Clara, 10 years old at the time, drops an f-bomb in church when calling out a priest. Clara gets more and more interesting from there.
“Hold it,” you say. “While I’ll grant that f-bombs dropped in the House of the Lord can be funny, how can a 10 year old girl be the Grandma spotlighted in this article?”
Yes, for the vast majority of the novel, Clara is not a Grandmother. She is a child, wife, and then a mother for nearly 95% of the novel and a Grandma for a scant 5%. But it is this sliver of the story I would like to direct your focus as Clara embodies the cohesion reflected in so many Grandmothers.
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“You can’t choose your family.”
This phrase, and countless others with similar sentiments, are pervasive in nearly every culture. From this singular concept there is a deluge of anecdotes ranging from racist aunts and incarcerated cousins, to family gatherings resulting in both figurative, and unfortunately literal, dick-measuring contests.
Every single one of us has a similar story to tell. And it begs the question as to why we put ourselves through it time and again. Sure, a gathering with family can be more interesting. After all, a dinner with a bunch of your facsimiles would be a quiet, dull affair where you all nod in unison to whatever inane topics you present to your other selves. But is “interesting” enough to keep families together?
There is a stronger force at work that creates a familial bond. That forms a cohesive unit. I’m not comfortable just chalking it up to “love.” It’s much more nuanced. If there is a name for it, I don’t know it. It’s like gravity before Newton; everyone senses it but it is unnamed and unmeasured. What we do know is that like gravity, the force can be more concentrated with one object than with another and that without that one object holding everything together, entire systems can be flung apart.
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In the latter section of The House of the Spirits, Clara, now an eccentric Grandmother, becomes that concentrated force for a family that is politically, socially, and economically fractured. Clara is the only link to individuals that in any normal circumstances would have nothing to do with each other. The strength of her cohesive force isn’t realized until her death when the family separates and their ancestral home falls to ruin.
Many of us have a similar person in our families. It’s often Grandma. The matriarch. A person with which the familial force is so concentrated that everyone else falls into its influence with little to no effort. The problem becomes that the years of not having to exert effort can lead to atrophy. And when the binding force falters, those orbiting suddenly disburse.
Too many families drift apart after the death of a Grandma. The gravitational void is nearly impossible to fill. But it can be done. It will take effort on all members of the family and there will be no more coasting. But it can be done.
So no, you can’t choose your family, but someday you will have to choose whether or not to keep it together.
Godspeed.
