This is the memory palace. I'm Nate de Mayo. When she found out they were going to shoot her

husband into space, Annie Glen wanted to talk to her minister. They were faithful people, the

Glens, devout Ohio Presbyterians, believers deep down. And when John Glen was chosen to be one

of the Mercury astronauts, Annie Glen wanted to make sure that that was okay, that man could leave

the planet and stay in God's good graces, or that the heavens weren't actually heaven.

Her minister consulted the scriptures and found no good reason to keep her husband earthbound.

And so on a March day in 1962, while John waited in a small metal capsule atop a 94-foot rocket,

for the clouds above the launch pad to flutter off and clear the Florida sky, Annie prayed,

for clear weather, for her husband's safe return, for America, the Glens were devout Ohio

Patriots, believers deep down. And then she sat on the rug in the living room in front of the TV,

hugging her knees to her chest, as Michigan control accounted down to lift off.

And then watched the smoke billow, and the flame flash, as her husband was propelled up into the blue.

And into the troposphere, and stratosphere, and mesosphere, and into the black.

He was to orbit the Earth three times in a little less than five hours. And there was much work

to do. John was a Navy man, a war hero, duty bound, yes sir, no sir. The right man for the job,

if the job was checking off an array of procedures and processes, and monitoring the capabilities of

the spacecraft and the space man. All the while keeping your eyes in your work,

while the Earth whips by your window, while Don turns today, turns tonight, turns to Don,

and on and on. While White Ribbons of Cloud, Royal, and Roll, and Break Over Bali,

are Boga Ratan, or Dar Salam. But somewhere above the South Pacific, as he rounded into his

second swing around the globe, something on his eye. This is friendship, and I'll try to describe

what I am in here. I am in a big mess of some very small particles that are brilliantly lit up,

...