An irascible old man wants nothing more that to get away from friends and family and all the interferences in his life so he can do nothing but write. He finds the solution by concocting a sham protest against the logging industry. However, his real agenda is to selfishly satisfy his desire for privacy. He succeeds in his quest for quiet by having his son-in-law build him a platform one hundred and fifty feet up on the side of a giant redwood and takes up residence in this aerie domicile for a period of 100 days. Although excluded from the world below he journeys daily in his mind through remembrances, philosophy, poetry, new discoveries about himself, and speculation about almost everything. He comes down a different man than the one who wanted so desperately to be alone.