"Surely it's all connected," she said. "Surely the fantasy stories my parents told me as a child, the long reminiscence of my grandparents about the 20th century, the lessons of felt and feeling in the sunday school room, the grand and complex explainations of science I learned at those small and compact desks in high school, that historic train of philosophical thoughts as long as their thinkers beards, even the clothes I wear, the coffee I drink, the words on the billboard––they must be all connected, all on some strange and savy stage where they play, perhaps even unknowingly, their parts."

"I'm afriad you may have missed the point, Ms. Thissland," Peter dryly replied.

"And what point may that be," asked Laura, head tilted, thinking, "unless...unless it is the point of life itself?"