Generally speaking, I sleep well. Not during one night this week.

I suspect it was the combination of bottled lager and dining late at the Golden Arches Restaurant, but indigestion was upon me in the early hours (as is too often the case these days). An antacid pill soon started to work, as did the paracetamol for the earlier sudden onset of a left sided sore throat. So far, so not so good.

I was away with work, alone in my hotel bed (still sleeping on the same side I occupy at home, the other side untouched as if I’m waiting for Mrs North to secretly appear). This wasn’t the time to start dreaming about suicide.

We all dream, that’s well known. We all dream weird things. No-one in their right mind would spend too long analysing dreams. Well, Freud and a whole industry of charlatans have. But, on waking, I felt both a strong sense of melancholy, a need to be at home and an urge to open a browser and find some so of explanation.

Without getting into the details (don’t you just hate that), the main premise was that I had – against my own underlying desires – decided to take my own life by overdose. Now, I know more than one person who’s attempted this, and at least one who has succeeded. Let’s get this straight: like old Mersault, I have no desire to die, and certainly never at my own hand. There are no Elysian fields awaiting the other side.

So I just don’t get why it should have entered my head, nor why it had so strong an effect. I ought to dismiss it as nonsense but as certain as I am dreams have no meaning, so I’m just as certain I know how I feel in reaction to it. Scared and worried, and a little more resolved to do some important things I need to for me and my family. Right now, in the here and now.

Which, after all, is what is most important. Whatever weird dreams may mean.