As Yahaira, Camino, and their respective families move forward in the aftermath of Papi’s sudden death in a plane crash, they struggle with immense and crushing grief. Clap When You Land insists that grief, while uncomfortable, is a normal and unavoidable part of losing a loved one—and that the healthiest way to move through one’s grief is to connect with others who either feel the same way or can offer support, rather than hiding or repressing one’s emotions. Though Yahaira and Camino live in different countries and spend most of the novel unaware of the other’s existence, they end up grieving Papi in extremely similar ways—ways that the novel suggests are ultimately unhelpful. Both girls refuse to cry or acknowledge their difficult emotions, and Yahaira brushes off a close family friend, Dr. Johnson, when she warns that keeping everything inside will mean that Yahaira will never be able to move on and recover. Yahaira and her mother, Mami, attempt to go to grief counseling sessions, but they ultimately stop going when they find them too painful. Camino also refuses to cry or talk about what she’s feeling, though she finds some solace in her aunt Tía’s religious ceremonies.
As Papi’s funeral in the Dominican Republic approaches—and as Yahaira and then Mami fly in from New York to attend—the novel suggests that while it may be uncomfortable to grieve with others, coming together to remember a deceased loved one is cathartic, restorative, and necessary. This, Yahaira begins to realize, is the whole point of funerals and other grief rituals, such as the novena (nine days of prayer): these rituals bring people together in their grief and offer a safe space to feel one’s emotions and connect with others who feel the same way. In addition, the spiritual or religious elements of such rituals offers extra comfort to those who practice. Indeed, at the end of the novel, even Mami—who initially refused to attend the funeral in the Dominican Republic—seems to have learned the importance of talking to others about grief, as she insists that she, Yahaira, and Camino return to the grief counseling sessions once they get back to New York. Grief, the novel shows, can be painful—but talking about grief and engaging in rituals that help people work through their emotions can help diminish that pain and encourage recovery.
Related Themes from Other Texts
Grief ThemeTracker
Grief Quotes in Clap When You Land
the crowd outside our little teal house expands.
People stand there in shorts and caps,
in thong sandals, the viejos held up by their bastones,
they shuffle onto the balcón,
they wrap their fingers around the barred fence,
they watch & wait & watch & wait an unrehearsed vigil.
& they pray & I try not to suffocate
under all the eyes that seem to be expecting
me to tear myself out of my skin.
[…] Before I learned to fear him,
there was one memory that kept coming back,
the one I cannot shake even as I shake when he approaches:
Cero has never appeared young to me. Always this same
age, this same face. But he would come to school
to pick Emily up. & she would stop
everything she was doing & run to him, arms spread wide.
He would catch her, swinging her in circles. & I was jealous.
Jealous I didn’t have a consistent male figure like Cero in my
life.
But before we got off at our stop,
Papi turned to my nine-year-old self & said:
“Never, ever, let them see you sweat, negra.
Fight until you can’t breathe, & if you have to forfeit,
you forfeit smiling, make them think you let them win.”
Without fail, most days I’m in school,
I get sent to the guidance counselor.
But I don’t have anything to tell her.
She asks me how I’m doing. Stupid fucking question.
I want to tell her some days I wake up
to find dents on the inside of my palms
from where I’ve fisted my hands while sleeping,
my nails biting into the skin & leaving angry marks.
On the days I wake up with smooth palms I’m angry at myself.
There should be no breaks from this grief. Not even in sleep.
I don’t tell her that. I don’t tell her anything.
I chew on the little green mints she offers & wait for the bell.
Even when he came to visit
this house he paid for & updated,
Papi treated Tía like an older sister:
so much respect for how she kept the house,
for the beliefs she had,
the decisions she made regarding my well-being.
They were friends. But until this moment
I have not thought of what she’s lost.
He was like her brother. Besides me, her only family.
Things you can buy
with half a million dollars:
a car that looks more
like a space creature than a car.
[…]
Five hundred flights
to the Dominican Republic.
A half million Dollar Store chess sets,
with their accompanying boxes.
A hundred thousand copies
of Shakespeare’s The Tempest.
Apparently a father.
I want to put my fingers
against my sister’s cheek.
I want to put my face
in her neck & ask
if she hurts the way I do.
Does she know of me?
Would my father have told her?
Did she share
in his confidences?
While the whole while he lied to me?
Or is she the only one
who would understand
my heart right now?
If I find her
would I find a breathing piece
of myself I had not known
was missing?
Tía Lidia puts her hand over mine. “Your mother is having
a tough time. Their marriage wasn’t easy, & she has so much
she’s dealing with. Yano was a great father to you,
& I know you loved him, but he wasn’t always a great husband.”
& I don’t know how one man can be so many different things
to the people he was closest to. But I nod. I almost slip and ask
does everyone know? But if they don’t I can’t be the one
to reveal the dirt on my father’s name.
The squares do not overlap.
& neither do the pieces.
The only time two pieces
stand in the same square
is the second before one
is being taken & replaced.
& I know now, Papi could not
move between two families.
[…]
He would glide from family to family,
square to square & never look back.
[…]
Everything has a purpose, Papi taught me.
But what was his in keeping
such big secrets?
Neither of us says a word.
On the screen, beyond where she can see my hand,
I trace her chin with my finger.
& for the first time
I don’t just feel loss.
I don’t feel just a big gaping
hole at everything
my father’s absence has consumed.
Look at what it’s spit out & offered.
Look at who it’s given me.
Papi will have two funerals.
Papi will have two ceremonies.
Papi will be mourned in two countries.
Papi will be said goodbye to here & there.
Papi had two lives.
Papi has two daughters.
Papi was a man split in two,
playing a game against himself.
But the problem with that
is that in order to win, you also always lose.
& there was a moment when the wheels first touched down
that my heart plummeted in my chest, but then we were slowing
& a smattering of passengers erupted into applause.
The old lady in the seat beside me said in Spanish,
“They don’t do that as much anymore. This must be a plane
of Dominicans returning home;
when you touch down on this soil, you must clap when you land.
Para dar gracias a dios. Regrezamos.” & I smiled back.
The ceremony we had for Papi in New York
is nothing compared to what is planned in DR.
Tía and Camino arrange an entire party.
Mami looks on disapprovingly
as a band of men in white show up with drums
& tambourines, & it’s a good thing the grave site
isn’t too far from the church because dozens
& dozens of people show up, until we’re a blur,
a smudge of people dressed like ash
advancing down the street.
I borrowed a light-colored dress from Camino,
& we walk down the street arm in arm.
People sing songs I don’t know.
I think Papi would have loved us making such a fuss.
[…] & here we are: Tía like a bishop,
slashing her long machete. Mami, the knight with rims. My body
in front of my sister’s body: queens.
Papi, who I know is here too. He did
build that castle he always promised.
She grabs her purse & drives out.
There was so much I had left to say:
That maybe a bad husband can still be a good parent.
That maybe he tried to be the best he knew how to be.
That he hurt her got caught up there’s no excuse.
But he is not here. He is not here. We are all that’s left.
I skim my feet in the water, with my face stroked by the sun
& pretend it is my father hands on my skin
saying sorry I love you welcome home goodbye.
I forgive you. I forgive you. I forgive you.
Say the waves. Say I.
