“The fir tree outside the living room window,” I answered. “The sumac next to it. Cows in the meadow across the way. The apple tree and the bridge.”

The living room door that had been left ajar opened. Alaska came in and curled up at my feet. I stood up and stuck my hands in his old fur. I tried to look out the window again but only saw myself all blurry. I closed my eyes. If I can’t get past this blankness, then that will be it, I thought, and life will take a wrong turn.

“Are you still there?” Frederik asked.

Things cannot disappear if you don’t look at them, the optician had said, or something like that, and I wondered if they can disappear if you speak to them.

“Yes, I’m sorry. I’m just drawing a blank. I’m very blurry.”

Frederik cleared his throat. “Your name is Luisa and I’m sure you have a last name, too. You’re twenty-two years old. Your best friend died because he leaned against a door on the local train that wasn’t properly shut. That was twelve years ago. Whenever your grandmother dreams of an okapi, someone dies soon after. Your father believes you can only become yourself somewhere far from home, so he’s traveling. Your mother has a flower shop and is having an affair with the owner of an ice-cream parlor whose name is Alberto. The optician took a saw to the posts of the hunting blind in the meadow because he wanted to kill the hunter. This optician is in love with your grandmother but won’t tell her. You’re doing a bookseller apprenticeship.”

I opened my eyes and smiled at myself in the windowpane. “The connection is very good,” I said.

“Pretty good,” Frederik said, “there’s just a faint rustling.”

I paced around the living room with the telephone. The cable followed me but the blankness didn’t.

“Have you done your walking meditation yet today?” I asked.

“No, but I did my sitting meditation. Early. For ninety minutes.”

I thought of the optician and his slipped disks from his sedentary occupation.

“Doesn’t it hurt?”

“Yes,” Frederik said, “it’s very uncomfortable. But that doesn’t matter.”

“Why did you become a monk?”

“Because it seemed right. Why did you become a bookseller?”

“Things worked out that way.”

“That’s good, too, if that’s how things work out,” Frederik said.

“Do you always wear that black robe?”

“Almost always.”

“Doesn’t it itch?”

“No,” Frederik said, “it really doesn’t. Luisa, it’s really nice to talk to you, but unfortunately I have to go now.”

“More meditating?”

“No, I’ve got to climb onto the roof and clear away the moss.”

I stopped in front of the section marked in red.