It's Inevitable

What's inevitable?  Death, of course.  They also say taxes.

Definitely death is inevitable, no one lives forever.  It's also something that we have to do alone.  No one can die for us and even if we die simultaneously, we're still alone in death.  Sleep is the other time when we are alone.  Think about it.  It really doesn't make any difference what's happening up until one falls asleep, whether you're literally alone in your bed, or whether you're sharing a bed, or even if you've just shared an intimate moment just before you fall asleep, when you fall asleep it's just you and you alone.

When you fall asleep you are just one of over seven billion persons of this planet who is in your body.  The day and evening might have been full of people, talking, laughing, quietly watching.  It might have been one other person, or dozens, or you might have had a quiet day by yourself.  As you drift into sleep, you slip into a place where no one from the day can or will go.

I find energy in working by myself in the shop, or even walking through the woods.  I often become exhausted among people.  There are conversations with single individuals that stimulate my senses, hence some times people energize my soul.  Yet, as I pull the quilt up over my shoulders, I still feel infinitely alone.  The other seven billion persons don't exist.  The thought can bring tears to my eyes.

It's not the only thought that brings tears to my eyes, I know, even though I question it daily, that there is a loving God.  I don't know much about God but there are several characteristics in which I'm confident.  God is not a old man with a long gray beard, nor is God male or female.  The Bible talks about fearing God, revering God, worshiping God, like God is "up there" and "out of reach."  Maybe that's correct.  The Bible also talks about "God is love," about God being better than one's own loving father.  God expects me to be a loving person, and that's also nearly impossible to understand, what it means to be a loving person, it can be interpreted so many different ways.

So as I lie on my pillow alone with only God with me, I know that God will be with me through the sleep even as God will be with me in death.  "Now I lay me down to sleep."  Totally alone and yet never alone.  The tears come from total exasperation in the aloneness and from the joy of never being alone.