Yara begins her journal on the advice of her therapist, William, even though she remains skeptical of the process. She writes that she is more of a visual thinker and struggles to connect words and thoughts.

Yara addresses her journal entries to her mother. In this first proper entry, Yara recounts an experience her mother had before Yara herself was born. Yara’s grandmother—her teta—passed on many of her superstitions to Yara’s mother, Meriem. Teta was particularly skilled at the practice of tabseer, or divining the future from coffee grounds. Just before Meriem married Yara’s father and left for the US, Teta read her coffee grounds. She saw “many nests,” signifying babies, but also signs of coming difficulties that Teta refused to discuss in detail. She told her daughter that she did not have to go, but Yara’s mother had already made up her mind. She saw no future for herself in Palestine. Teta gave Meriem a necklace with a hamsa charm—an amulet depicting an open hand that, in Middle Eastern culture, is believed to provide protection from the evil eye—when they parted.