Sleep

The sanctity of sleep.
I sit here watching my cat Russ, curled into a circle,,little nose tucked into his belly and his tail carefully wrapped around his bum. His eyes are closed so tight. He is in a very happy place right now.
On the floor is Bell,, stretched out on her side,, snoring and on the chair is Nanette,, sleeping upside down, feet in the air but weak at the joints with total relaxation.
Animals really know how to enjoy the comforts around them. The positions, the deepness of their sleep,, just makes me envious.
You know when your a kid,, you can sleep like that. Any position, anywhere and you never wake up all screwed up by how you've slept.
Now, all I have to do is lay wrong and my body screams at me all day long for the damage I did to it,, just sleeping.
Where along the way did it become possible to screw up sleeping so badly that your body hurts for it the next day?
Every once in a while,, perhaps with the help of some Kahlua and coke or a nice Tylenol P.M. I get the opportunity to find that place of total relaxation. The one where your floating and your body feels like mush. Love it..
Oh the sanctity of sleep. Reminds me of one of my favorite poems:

The Sacrament of Sleep

Thank God for sleep!
And , when you cannot sleep,
Still thank Him that you live
To lie awake.

And pray Him, of His grace,
When He sees fit, sweet sleep to give,
That you may rise, with new-born eyes,
To look once more into His shining face.

In sleep-limbs all loose-laxed- and slipt the chains-
We draw sweet-close to Him from whom our breath
Has life. In His sole hands we leave the reins,
In fullest trust Him for life or death.

This sleep in life close kinsman is to death;
And, as from sleep we wake to greet the day,
So, too, from death we shall with joy awake
To greet the glories of The Great Essay.

To His belov'd new life in sleep He gives,
And, unto all, awakening from sleep,
Each day is resurrection-a new birth
To nearer heaven and recreated earth-
To all Life's possibilities-of good
Or ill-with joys and woes endued-
Till that last, shortest sleep of all,
And that first great awakening from Life's thrall.

Thank God for sleep!
And when you cannot sleep,
Still thank Him for the grace
That lets you live
To feel the comfort of His soft embrace.

John Oxenham