Thomas Merton's Hermitage

My god-daughter just posted a Thomas Merton quote on Facebook and it led me to Google "merton hermitage" -- actually, I googled "merton germitage" but the software is so blazingly brilliant that it knew what I meant.

Anyway, I just watched a 10 minute You-Tube video of Merton's hermitage there on the grounds of his monastery in Kentucky. Very interesting.

And NOT at all what I have been imagining for years.

Have you seen any pictures of it? It's at least 4 times larger than I had pictured it in my head. And I'd always pictured it as wooded right up to his doorstep; whereas there are mowed lawns around it, at least when the video was taken.

I'm not a HUGE Merton disciple. I've just liked a lot of what I have read by him. Just not sure at the moment how this makes me feel. Like he is more approachable maybe? Or that his example is more follow-able? Although I could never quite put together just how it was he was in a "silent" order yet had visitors, wrote so much (a huge personal correspondence, too), and traveled across the globe.

Then again I'm a Lutheran. Maybe I just don't understand.