When Gethsemenai had finally agreed to amend the order by building a small cinderblock hermitage atop a hill for Merton to live in solitude, the saint was overjoyed, but slightly cautious, and even apprehensive that he might survive the danger of being alone.

And so one night he confessed to feelings of being swept away by the sea of solitude. He fell apart.

"I talk to myself, I dance around the hermitage, I sing. This is all very well, but it is not serious, it is a manifestation of weakness," he wrote.

But perhaps not. Or, if weakness, the right kind of weakness, the right king of "interruptability" and awareness...

Merton continues his confessions another day:

"I confess that I am sitting under a pine tree doing absolutely nothing. I have done nothing for one hour and firmly intend to continue to do nothing for an indefinite period...I have taken my shoes off. I confess that I have been listening to a mockingbird...I confess furthermore that there is a tanager around her somewhere..."

I love this (particularly the confession of having taken off his shoes). Here is a life set free, beyond the suspicions and words, the "manifestations of weakness," into the great delight of Being, the open fields of fun and adventure!

Reading this today gives me the urge to go and play, to find some friends and gather up some wiffle ball with time eternal, an indefinite period!