A man's lonely life focused on the pursuit of reason and music leaves him questioning what more there may be in the lives of other people and of religion.

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.

The tragic loss of his childhood friend puts a boy on the path of religion - but his inner feelings remain as repressed and turbulent as they always were.

A research psychologist visits a peculiar asylum patient who recounts his life story. The patient warns the researcher about how obsession with the pursuit of knowledge can make one lose sight of their humanity until it is unsalvageable.

A progressive and bitter father going through a mid-life crisis goes on holiday to a water park with his wife and excitable son. He casually confronts racist and irritable guests while trying to figure out how to be a good dad.

After a drunk college boy falls off a balcony, a slew of characters--a groundskeeper, another student, a chaplain, and an RA--relate to his death in different ways. Their stories are sidelined for the core matter: that a boy died.

After two of a man's acquaintances die by suicide, he goes on a hunting trip and can't stop thinking about why they wanted to die.

As she wanders in and out of forests to escape her past and the boy she feels guilty for wanting, a woman gives birth to and abandons a child she thinks of as the physical embodiment of her sin.

Terrence and Ruth, a middle-aged couple, move house for a fresh start - but their new house is in disrepair. Ruth contends with sickness, unfulfillment, and her staling marriage while laboriously cleaning it.

When Harold's wife dies, seemingly by malicious cause, he becomes the prime suspect. As the public defender investigates her death, he finds that she may have held secrets herself.