A restless housewife gives up sleeping for seventeen days during which she regains the side of her that was lost since she got married. Her lack of sleep finally catches up to her with life-threatening consequences.

A man reflects on the loneliness of his childhood home, where his family would fervently clean the house every Saturday for guests on Sunday who would never show.

On a whim, a man decides to cancel his children's music lessons and take them out for a day, hoping for quiet fun and an opportunity to learn more about their lives.

A young boy who lives in the prairie is excited for the rare opportunity to go into town to see the fourth of July parade and celebrations. However, his day takes a turn for the worse when the family's car will not start.

One Mother's Day, two old women reflect on their relationships with their children--present and absent--and with the same adulterous man. When their paths cross at a crucial moment, one woman's refusal to accept the help of her husband's secret lover leads to her death.

In a series of commentaries on the human condition — life, truth, happiness, death — a spinster sister takes in her dead sister’s children; a man is entranced by the endless waves which roll and crash in the ocean; a carpenter wrestles with the burden of being everyone’s confidante; a dying railroad crossing watchman shares a simple but complex wisdom.

A man develops a deep interest in the author of a children's book he reads to his daughters. Ignoring his wife's confusion and mild disapproval, he goes to visit the author's old house and takes his daughters with him.

Stinging from his recently cut-off engagement, a young man retreats to a small town in the mountains of Virginia to work as city editor of the local newspaper. Alternately entranced and disgusted with his hermit-like nocturnal life, he finds peace and pleasure listening to the St. Anthony Chorale.

A writer wakes up every day hoping each day would be the day he finally manages to write, though each day he finds new reasons to delay his writing.

When a woman finds her purse stolen, she retraces the steps of her eventful day only to realize that the encounters, and her life as a whole, are empty and purposeless.