The narrative opens with the author revisiting his childhood home at Glenmerle, and the place will serve as a touchstone throughout the book. On the one hand, Glenmerle is a real, physical location. It is the place that helps to form the young Van’s imagination and desires. When Van narrates his anonymous midnight visit, he speaks about being able to imagine all the important people with whom he shared time there. He can imagine exactly how his bedroom last appeared. He can recall what it looks like peering out his bedroom window into the forest, where he first learned to appreciate beauty and mystery.

On the other hand, Glenmerle is always seen in an idealistic and almost mythical light, even coming to serve as a kind of Platonic Form of the reality of home. Whenever he thinks back on his life, he imagines that this feeling of home was formed by his time spent in such a loving place, and he similarly can imagine that the eventual passage from this life to the next would be like coming home, as he used to do at Glenmerle. When Davy is in her final days, for instance, she speaks of hoping to one day be with Van again at Glenmerle: “‘Maybe we’ll be allowed to meet again at Glenmerle if…’ And I put my arm around her and said, ‘A heavenly Glenmerle.