Once Again It's 4 a.m. 

So many things could be waking me up.

Is it the 12 hour decongestant I took at 8 a.m. yesterday morning?

Is it my "time of life"... again?

Is it the "blue light" stimulation from being on the computer too close to bedtime?

Is it the recurring back stiffness and at times pain from this herniated disc?

Do one of these things awaken me, but then my mind switches to the "on" mode?

Images and thoughts come unbidden into the half awake/half asleep place.

I finally realize I have been awake too long to stay in bed and go back to sleep.

I have to get up, make my beloved fragrant hot Aveda Comfort Tea/ Sinus Soother Sleepytime cocktail, sit in the semi-darkness of dimmed lights and get the thoughts out of my head.

The images and thoughts are so many things...

Too many things to write out here...

God, You know I desire to sleep deep and undisturbed. You know that it has so long been an issue, so I trust you in this...again.

I feel secure in you when I fall to sleep and what can I do but turn to you when I "fall awake"?

I lay my sighs before you and all those things that make up those sighed prayers...all those concerns, all those images of people I love, people I know or have met, and those murky images of the past or of an unknown future.

I know you hear me, I want to wait in expectation, but I also want to sleep...the deep restful sleep that I seem to remember from some time a very long time ago.

The furnace cycles on, the house creaks as cold areas warm up, I have finished my tea and and as David the Psalm-writing king did I also I offer my words, my sighs, my cries, my prayers, my voice, and my request to You O Lord.

Help me to wait in expectation...to sit with you a while and just be in your presence...to know you.