Funny how my prayer life is more intense and heartfelt at 3 am. It always has been. I remember many nights when a nursing baby rocked in my arms to the rhythm of the rosary. Other times it would be a wheezing, feverish child on my shoulder, listening to the Ave Maria while percussion therapy opened his lungs to the night air. And when life comes hard at an adult child, the "bo-bo's" are more difficult to hug and kiss away -- "Little kids, little problems. Big kids..... Well, you know the adage.
More often the distress that finds me staring wildly at the changing numbers on the clock is more difficult to pinpoint. It is as though a stream of consciousness hits a sharp curve and the banks overflow. Again, there is that endless sinking feeling, until I remember to grab hold of His hand. Finally, in silent, intense prayer, I stop laboring over my inability to walk on water, the storm dies down, the sea calms, and I am re-centered.
