Mid-Night Brain Rumbles

I write my best blog posts in my head in the middle of the night. And then, when I sit down to write in the daylight...nothing comes. I wonder what it is about the deep dark of the night. The way the quiet and the shadows break through my brain and push down the walls of defense that I cling so tightly to during the daytime hours. The cogs of the wheels start turning and churning. Hidden portals of my mind open up like great garage doors...exposing all the junk I collect throughout the day. I am closest to God in these moments and most likely closest to my real self.

Sometimes, I will get up and go lay in the guest bed and read or journal. My minions (otherwise known as The Dog and The Cat) always join me. They have become a normal part of my solitude. My little living angels of grace. Sometimes my husband will come in and check on me. Most of the time he slumbers away, unaware of my mid-night wanderings and wonderings. 

What do I think about at 3 am? What don't I think about? I am just like every other living female on the face of the earth. Sometimes I spend hours thinking about all that needs to get done. I make my to do list and my shopping list and my personal growth list and my bucket list and my leap list all in my head...only to forget it all in the morning. Ha. 

I am learning to pray a little more. A little more deeply. This seems like a good time to do this. All the earth seems so quiet and far away and heaven or the universe or whatever it is out beyond seems a little bit closer to me. A little easier to grasp.

Sometimes I think about cancer. I think about life before cancer and life now. People are different. I am different. Cancer brings on a subtle yet undeniable shift in all my relationships. I toss around in my head whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. I can't define it. It is neither. It just is. 

I think about pain. Ever notice how we feel pain more intensely at nighttime? I know there is a biological reason for this...the endorphins in our bodies have dropped off for the night. Even they need a break from the daylight. But, even as our pain is more intense, our emotional strength is at it's weakest, I think. In the middle of the night, a tiny little gas pain becomes the beginning of the end in my head. A toe cramp? A sign that something in my body is seriously not working right. This is another subtle change of cancer...pain is no longer just pain. Every tiny pain gets examined and analyzed by me and all of The Google. If I wasn't a hypochondriac before (I was), I most certainly am now. And The Google. It knows.

Sometimes, I lay in bed and feel rage at my husband and The Dog and The Cat for being able to sleep so easily. How dare they! I fake cough, I deep sigh, I groan...in  hopes of bringing one of them to my side of the sleepless night.

Last night...I contemplated joy. I was reading before bed One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp again and a statement jumped out at me and slapped me in the face. "Expectations kill joy". How true is this!? How many times have I placed my own expectations on a relationship, on an event, on an outcome, on MYSELF...only to be hurt or disappointed? In 38 years? A lot! This is another one of those balancing acts I haven't figured out. I remember writing in my journal YEARS ago...contemplating the subtle difference between expectation and hope. Maybe not the difference, so much, but the possibility of having hope without expectation. It seems hard. It seems nearly impossible. But, I know it must be attainable. Hmm. I guess I am just gonna have to wait til another sleepless night arrives and I can puzzle it out in my un-hindered brain.

Have a great night, y'all!!

Love, Vashni