I FOUND  myself the other night a sleepless guest in a house with a great deal of ambient nocturnal light. It came from two high street lamps, neighbours’ security lights and a lot of passing traffic …

My friend’s glazed front door was simply astonishing, a glowing blaze of fiery light which I found hypnotic. Sleepless as I was with ideas, new characters, old ones paying a friendly nocturnal visit and certain problems of plot and pacing, I diverted myself by taking a photo of the front door.

Later, still awake, I stood at the dining room window looking out onto the street. I would never do this at home lest my neighbours think I’m odd, which is daft really because they probably already think that anyway. But in a strange house it seemed legitimate and so I stood staring out at nothing in particular for quite a long time. Then, turning to head for the kitchen and a cup of tea I caught a brief glimpse of my profile before my movement made it disappear. Intrigued, I decided take a second photo, this one of my shadow, as I was curious to see what is otherwise impossible for me to see.

So here it is, a self portrait of the insomniac writer thinking about (on this occasion) whether the photograph would be worth looking at. Maybe it is, maybe not.

But here’s a thought.

If I make a hard copy of it and put it among others in my loft, then maybe when I’m gone and my children go through my things to clear them out, they’ll see this picture and one of them will say, ‘That’s Daddy! I wonder what he was thinking about!?’ Then, after a pause for thought, one of them might add, ‘I wonder who took it?’

If there’s life after death, which I personally doubt, but if there is… my ghostly voice will answer, ‘An insomniac took it, you knew him well!’

LINKS: For those who like Al Pacino and thrillers the film Insomnia is worth watching, here’s the link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0278504/ which includes an excellent trailer. As this post implies, insomnia worries me not at all,  so I won’t offer a single one of the plus-500,000 pages Google lists under ‘Insomnia Cures’. But this Wikipedia entry offers some fascinating insights about insomnia as well as further links of its own: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insomnia