Western New York, 1978: Jamie, Lewis, and Connor Thurber watch their parents' marriage rapidly unravel. Their alcoholic dad, Terrance Thurber, teaches them all he knows about nature, but then he leaves the family. Alone with their artist mother, Catrin, the Thurber children are left to grapple with the anger they feel for the one parent who deserted them and a growing resentment for the one who didn't. Once they can leave—Jamie for college, Lewis for the navy, and Connor for work—they don't look back. But Terrance does, and finding that his adult children are teetering on the edge of their own failures, he crosses the country to make one last try to build a bridge, through the years, to his family.