In the valley of the normal, events unfold just like the Joneses’ eviction: they appear normal in hindsight, although they were not expected, and although we could not have predicted them. This is because the process of understanding reality is backward-looking. An occurrence that was not actively anticipated (the eviction of the Jones family) triggers a search of memory for a candidate cause (the tough job market, the inflexible manager). The search stops when a good narrative is found.
