Been Sleeping Too Long

Sleep is one of the many life-mysteries that fascinates me.  Every living human has to have it.  The younger we are - the more we require for optimum growth, rejuvenation, and good health.  Adults can function on less.
 Studies show if we get too little sleep, our bodies' functions are below normal. Surprisingly, if we get too much sleep, we become lazy and mortality rates go up.
 Sometimes I lie down at night, wiggle into my comfort spot and think about the perplexities of sleep.  My eyes are about to close, and I'm going to lie semi-conscious for six to seven hours.  While I'm in that "lah-lah" land, my body goes through cycles of regenerative work of which I'm totally unaware!
 When I see graphs that show we sleep around 30% of our lifetimes, I wonder if I could do with less sleep and more waking time.  If not, the fact challenges me to make the most of the two-thirds of a lifetime that I am awake.
 In that two-thirds portion I've come to some reality checks:
1)  Our nation is asleep - at least that's the only explanation that brings light to our present  condition.
2)  We've grieved over the twenty children massacred in Newtown, but who is grieving over the sixty million exterminated in the womb since legalization of abortion?
3) This year marks year 40 of the Roe vs Wade decision.  Is that a milestone that a nation celebrates, ignores, wails, or repents?
4) Only one generation has passed from children walking and playing unharmed and unsupervised in our towns and communities to children in lock-down lifestyles.
5) My childhood pastimes were Hide-and-seek, Red Rover, and t.v. visits with Captain Kangaroo.  Today's children are exposed to violent video games, R-rated take-home movies, and team sports that consume an entire childhood.
6) Commitment and forgiveness are words fitting less and less into today's vocabularies.
7) Historians recorded ancient Rome's practice of discarding its unwanted or "imperfect" babies on hillsides outside of Rome as a blight on its history.  Our nation leaves the same innocent in garbage dumpsters outside of abortion clinics; and our government subsidizes it.
8) The movement to override God's laws with man's has stepped from subtle to blatant.
9) We're presently living in a culture of death - the death of our liberties, our economy, our two-parent families, our parents' values, morality, absolutes, patriotism, and our churches' influence.
10) God is our only hope!
 My kids will tell me that "The Playhouse" turned political this week.  They may be right, but I'd rather say I'm just waking up from a much too long sleep.

Camille Anding