There’s a joke that goes something like this: what do you call it when you can’t sleep, so you get up at midnight and make yourself a snack? Insom-nom-nom-ia.

Get it? Cue the rim shot.

But I can speak from experience about insomnia. I have those nights from time to time. It seems like the more I want to sleep, the more I try to sleep, the more awake I become. Sometimes, those thoughts in your head just won’t lie down, kinda like me when I was little and told I needed to take a nap.

But imagine if those nights are God trying to get your attention. Instead of becoming increasingly annoyed and agitated, try using it as a time for hearing from God at a time when you’re least distracted and have the least amount of stuff going on.

I think about little Samuel in the middle of the night when God kept calling his name. He kept thinking it was Eli, but finally realized it was God. Eli instructed him for when the next time God called to respond, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

Maybe that’s a good prayer for the middle of the night when sleep won’t come. Not that I’m an expert at that. I’m more the agitated forgetting to pray type.

But hopefully the next time, I will remember that prayer that consists of seven words: Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.

Tonight after I got home from my Franklin shenanigans, I decided to spin some vinyl on the ol’ turntable. It’s still a good way to wind down at the end of the day.

For my listening selection, I had Minute by Minute by the Doobie Brothers, the Traveling Wilburys, and Soldiers Under Command by Stryper. I think that officially qualifies as eclectic. And they were all old school, which to me is the best.

What is it about dropping the needle on the record that sends a surge of dopamine to my brain? I have no idea. I just know that I go to my happy place whenever a record is playing. Or when a vinyl is spinning, to put it more coolly.

Half the fun is the hunt when you don’t know what you will find (or if you will find anything). The other half is playing what you find and hearing memories come to life. You can debate all day long whether CDs or records sound better, but in my mind nothing sounds better than the music I grew up on coming back to life through my speakers. That’s magic.

One of Peanut’s favorite activities is to go hide somewhere and take a nap. I think that’s the dream of just about every adult these days. To be able to sleep in peace and quiet without any interruptions or catastrophes would be right at the top of most of our lists.

I say hide and seek world champion, but that’s only in her mind. She thinks that if she can’t see you, you can’t see her. But usually there’s the telltale lump under the bed covers that gives her away. Or it’s all the pillows from my bed knocked askew.

Every now and then, she really does hide. I have no idea where. My guess is that she has access to some sort of wormhole or portal to another dimension when she really wants her privacy. Either that or she’s sporting an invisibility cloak a la Harry Potter.

Basically, she likes to be covered up. Whether it’s underneath blankets or behind pillows, she loves her an enclosed space with just enough room for her and her whiskers. I suppose that’s a cat thing rooted in their need for safety from predators out in the wild (or dust bunnies in the house).

One day, I may just sit her down and have a heartfelt talk about why she does what she does. Until then, I suppose it’s anyone’s guess.

I used to think that sometimes God answers our prayers for healing, and sometimes He doesn’t. Like sometimes He says yes, sometimes no.

But maybe God always heals, but not always in the way we expect. Sometimes, it’s earthly but sometimes not until heaven.

I found this post that speaks to when God’s answer to our prayers for healing don’t look like what we hoped for or anticipated. But since God is always good, His gifts and His answers are always good.

“When you pray for someone to be healed but the opposite happens, you sometimes wonder if your prayer wasn’t good enough or if you aren’t righteous enough or your faith tank is too low. Other times you wonder why some people get that wow-God, triumphant miracle story while you sit there still praying, still waiting, changing up the words you pray to find that perfect key-fit to unlock the miracle. When it comes to God healing or choosing not to heal, I know the right answer in my brain, but my heart doesn’t get it and keeps asking, ‘why?’

One day while I was pondering that, a very wise friend, Tia Willin Collin said this and in one fell swoop, called a truce between my head and my heart. Here’s what she said about God sometimes choosing not to heal:

‘Wait what? God doesn’t always heal? I disagree! Prayers for healing are the safest prayers we can pray because God always says ‘yes’. Now…let’s define ‘yes’. If he heals you here, your healing is temporary. It’s still good and amazing, but it will not last forever. You will get sick again. You will die. I’ve never met a 2,000 year old Christian! But if he releases you from your mortal body, and heals you in THAT way, then, you are healed forever! No more sickness, no more pain, no more tears. The problem isn’t, sometimes God heals and sometimes he doesn’t, the problem is, we’ve begun to cherish ‘temporary healing’ over ‘eternal healing’ so much so, we now dismiss eternal healing as any type of healing at all’” (Lisa Barry).

When I was at Goodwill earlier, I thought I heard a familiar song. I was in the line to check out when I first became aware of the song that sounded like I had heard it before. I waited for a certain part to know if it was the song I was thinking about. It was.

You ever do that? You hear a song that sounds vaguely familiar, but you can’t be sure until there’s a certain phrase or riff or melody that solidifies it for you.

In my case, it was a song called Set Adrift on Memory Bliss by PM Dawn. That actual song might not be one you recognize, but there is a sample from an 80s song that a lot more people know. The sample is from the song True by Spandau Ballet.

The point is that it was a moment where I recognized the song and thought about how it had been a long time since I last heard it. It takes me back to the good old 90s when life seemed a lot simpler and when there was way less technology demanding our attention.

I like those moments. It’s like for a split second I can pretend that I am 19 again and the whole wide world is still ahead of me. And the song is not bad, either.