Summary

Chapter 12, "Closer," opens with Jon and Iris lying together in a field a ways away from the farmhouse that they have just planted with all kinds of fruits and vegetables. John tells her that soon after his wife Laura left him for the continued, unaddressed consequences of his post-Vietnam trauma, he was so despondent that he allowed himself to wet the bed and lay in it until he took his rifle and went up onto the roof and started shooting. He was arrested and left reeking in a jail crowded cell surrounded by people who did not care about him, and when he was released, he never went home and since then has stayed on the streets. He admits to having a hard time holding his sanity together sometime, and knows how broken he is, but he can also experience joy and beauty...