Feeling responsible for his wife's accidental death, Robert embarks on a cross-country trip with his infant son in search for the baby's estranged grandfather. Along the way they encounter a gallery of colorful family members and strangers, each providing a stepping stone toward their destination. The father-son bond grows each day, but the guilt and loneliness deepen the man's despair. As the landscape changes from the autumn colors of the Northeast to the barren terrain of Badlands and Utah, the man begins to entertain the notion of giving his son up for adoption. The plan to abandon the child takes an unexpected turn upon discovering the grandfather's dwelling in Northern California.