Ali Shams reflects deeply on his dai­ly life work­ing at a chick­en breed­ing farm in Fort Wayne, a place that func­tions less like a tra­di­tion­al farm and more like a high-effi­cien­cy lab­o­ra­to­ry. The farm is designed to pro­duce chick­ens that grow as quick­ly and effi­cient­ly as pos­si­ble, with the pri­ma­ry objec­tive being to con­vert grains into pro­tein. The unnat­ur­al envi­ron­ment is evi­dent in the process, where chick­ens are bred to sur­vive with­out immune sys­tems and are kept in com­plete­ly con­trolled set­tings, free from nat­ur­al ele­ments that would allow them to thrive on their own. The descrip­tion of the farm empha­sizes the stark con­trast between nat­ur­al ani­mal hus­bandry and the mech­a­nized, indus­tri­al process­es that dom­i­nate mod­ern agri­cul­ture, high­light­ing the cost of pri­or­i­tiz­ing effi­cien­cy over life’s nat­ur­al rhythms.

The protagonist’s life extends beyond his work, encom­pass­ing his rela­tion­ship with his son, Cyrus, whose inquis­i­tive nature and intel­li­gence pro­vide moments of joy in an oth­er­wise monot­o­nous rou­tine. Their time togeth­er is lim­it­ed, yet the bond between them is strength­ened through shared activ­i­ties like cook­ing meals togeth­er and watch­ing their favorite movies. Cyrus, although still a child, dis­plays matu­ri­ty and curios­i­ty about the world around him, engag­ing in intel­lec­tu­al pur­suits like chess and read­ing, which often spark mean­ing­ful con­ver­sa­tions between father and son. These inti­mate moments not only deep­en their con­nec­tion but also serve as a reminder to the father of the lessons he learned in his own child­hood, offer­ing a glimpse into how fam­i­ly tra­di­tions and wis­dom can tran­scend gen­er­a­tions, enrich­ing both par­ent and child.

Along­side the per­son­al reflec­tions, the work envi­ron­ment on the farm becomes a lens through which the com­plex­i­ties of human labor and cul­tur­al exchange are explored. Each day, the pro­tag­o­nist engages in tasks like gath­er­ing and wash­ing eggs, which, while seem­ing­ly rou­tine, take on deep­er sig­nif­i­cance when placed against the back­drop of his rela­tion­ship with his cowork­ers. Many of these cowork­ers are immi­grants like him­self, and the farm becomes a micro­cosm for shared strug­gles and the blend­ing of cul­tur­al iden­ti­ties. The con­ver­sa­tions often cen­ter around food, with each work­er shar­ing sto­ries about their homeland’s cui­sine, using food as a com­mon ground to con­nect and bond. The use of Eng­lish as a uni­fy­ing lan­guage reflects the blend­ing of var­i­ous back­grounds, as the work­ers forge their own com­mu­ni­ty with­in the con­fines of the farm, unit­ed by both neces­si­ty and com­mon expe­ri­ence.

The protagonist’s reflec­tions deep­en as he con­sid­ers the growth of his son, Cyrus, whose thirst for knowl­edge brings immense pride to his father. Cyrus’s intel­lec­tu­al pur­suits, includ­ing his inter­est in chess and his inde­pen­dent explo­rations, show a matu­ri­ty and inde­pen­dence that sur­pass his years. The father takes pride in his son’s grow­ing curios­i­ty, which con­trasts sharply with his own more rou­tine-dri­ven life. This inter­gen­er­a­tional exchange is cen­tral to the nar­ra­tive, as it high­lights the evolv­ing rela­tion­ship between par­ent and child, where each gen­er­a­tion teach­es the oth­er new lessons. The father finds a renewed sense of pur­pose through Cyrus’s ambi­tions, which reignite a sense of pride in the fam­i­ly’s con­tin­ued growth and learn­ing, despite the often harsh real­i­ties of dai­ly life.

The chap­ter’s nar­ra­tive is also infused with deep­er exis­ten­tial reflec­tions, with the pro­tag­o­nist con­tem­plat­ing the nature of human expe­ri­ence through the lens of an ancient hadith about suf­fer­ing and pur­pose. This hadith speaks to the idea that suf­fer­ing, while unavoid­able, can be a means through which peo­ple find their true pur­pose in life. The father, deeply absorbed in these thoughts, strug­gles to rec­on­cile the cycli­cal nature of his exis­tence with the desire for some­thing more mean­ing­ful. He wres­tles with the bal­ance between his work, his fam­i­ly, and his own per­son­al reflec­tions, all while remain­ing ground­ed in the sim­ple joys and bur­dens that come with life’s rou­tine. Despite the weight of these thoughts, the father’s reflec­tions are not with­out moments of clar­i­ty, where the small moments of con­nec­tion with his son offer a reprieve from the heav­i­ness of his dai­ly life.

Ulti­mate­ly, the chap­ter paints a pic­ture of a life defined by the jux­ta­po­si­tion of rou­tine and intro­spec­tion, hard work and famil­ial love. The father’s jour­ney is not marked by extra­or­di­nary moments but by the qui­et, con­sis­tent efforts he makes to bal­ance his respon­si­bil­i­ties and nur­ture his rela­tion­ship with his son. While their lives are often filled with hard­ship and rou­tine, these shared moments offer a brief respite from life’s strug­gles, pro­vid­ing both of them with a sense of mean­ing and con­nec­tion. In the end, the pro­tag­o­nist accepts that life’s dif­fi­cul­ties are part of the human expe­ri­ence and that embrac­ing the mun­dane moments, rather than seek­ing escape from them, is where true ful­fill­ment lies. The weight of life’s bur­dens becomes bear­able when shared with those we love, and through this lens, the father learns to find pur­pose in the small, seem­ing­ly insignif­i­cant moments that make up a life.