Aloma and Orren face various disagreements throughout the
novel, most notably Aloma’s nomadic desire to leave the old house and Orren’s
familial duty to stay. Aloma has never really felt bound to any one place or person
in her life, since her parents died when she was very young and even the aunt
and uncle who raised her only “cared in a middling, impersonal way that
instinctively reserved their best for their own” (12). Starting from a young
age, this detachment developed throughout Aloma’s life but shifted when she met
Orren. He is the first person with whom she feels a true connection, both
physically and emotionally. Yet once she is living with him at his family’s old
house, those feelings of detachment resurface and she wants to leave.
Orren takes over his family’s responsibilities with a
stubborn resolve to keep the farm running. Although his stubbornness leaves
Aloma feeling spiteful and forgotten, she almost admires Orren’s strict work
ethic. “She had never been driven by the imminent loss of something like a home.
It was more a matter of what she did not have than of what she could not stand
to lose. She had wanted to possess something and when she wanted a thing, she
wanted it bad” (36). Aloma’s desires are intangible, such as her wish to play
piano and make beautiful music; however, she is always looking for something
more. Even her efforts to “line up her wanting with the same want that sent Orren
out of the house each morning and kept him there until the sun fell” proved
fruitless (37).
The incompatibility between Aloma and Orren’s wanting intensifies
when Aloma develops feelings for the preacher Bell. She wonders about other men
– “she wondered…how it would feel to have someone else sleep beside her, or be
inside her even, and if that would speak to her happiness, which she felt lay
unborn within her” (127). One night, she dreams of being with Bell and,
frightened by her unconscious desires, she feels she has to “reassure herself
that it was Orren she wanted” (168). This makes Aloma question her own happiness.
“Here she was, on her side under white sheets the open sun lit brilliantly…and still
she wanted something, still she was unsatisfied. When had she ever once been
full?” (168-169).
This experience leads Aloma to appreciate what she has,
rather than searching for more somewhere else. She thinks, “what a waste it was
to ever think of going, how wasteful…wasteful of creation…to run and seek after
another only to find that the gulf was there too…she had indeed been foolish,
for thinking that the easy thing was the one worth wanting” (175). She knows
she loves Orren, but realizes that they will have to work together at their
relationship for the rest of their marriage. They have a ways to go but together
they can strengthen their relationship and realign their desires to complement
each other, rather than clash with each other.
I agree that Aloma’s experience with Bell is what drives her back to Orren, and your exploration of the quote “how wasteful…wasteful of creation…to run and seek after another only to find that the gulf was there too” (175) provides an interesting way of thinking about how Bell shapes Aloma and Orren’s relationship. However, I think it is also important to note how Bell does this. It is not simply the questioning of a possibility of a relationship with Bell that leads her back to Orren but a lack of choice. Aloma’s eyes are opened that Bell is no better than Orren, and by noting when she sees his piano, “she would have thought Bell a better man than that, a man who would care especially for something – a piano, an old house, a woman” (136). In this way, Aloma realizes Bell is not a “better man” because he takes care of his piano in the same way as Orren, putting them on equal footing. Although she still longs for Bell after that, when Bell discovers that Aloma has been living with Orren, he notes “I want you to go,” (172), indicating that he is no longer an option for her. Thus, when Aloma asks Bell to marry Orren and her, he says “But this ain’t about happiness – not mine, not yours, not Orren’s” (189). By saying it “ain’t about happiness,” Bell is indicating that the conclusion not the choice that makes anyone their happiest selves but rather results from a lack of choice for all. However, it is what is necessary to be done, as Aloma already resigned herself to Orren by living with him. In this way, this suggests that Aloma and Orren’s relationship will always take work because of the lack and choicelessness in their relationship.
ReplyDeleteI think that “The Grass is Not Always Greener on the Other Side” is an important theme in All the Living. Although, I think that Aloma feels empty because she does not know what the grass looks like on the other side. She has finally married Orren by the end of the book, but she still knows there is more that she could do with her life. I think she is so “stuck” in her life because no one has ever truly shown her what a better life can be. Even though Aloma was fascinated with Bell and found his preaching’s full of wisdom, he was unable to show her a better life, just like Orren. One of Bell’s sermons reads, “It’s a thing we’re all wearied of, each the one of us, this being amongst all the people and ever being alone.” This quote resonates with Aloma because she feels like the loneliest person in the world. She is locked into this mundane life and does not know how to escape it. She wants to see the grass on the other side but one of the book’s great tragedies is that we know Aloma will never truly get to experience this ‘grass’. I do agree that Aloma and Orren will have to work together to strengthen their relationship, but even if they do, I would not consider that an achievement that would make Aloma happy. As long as she stays in that house, she will never feel as if her life is being lived the way she truly wants
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