Al Batt’s columns appear every Wednesday and Sunday.

The glowing face of the clock radio was not my friend.

I couldn’t sleep.

I couldn’t even find an entry-level position into the world of sleep.

I tried counting sheep, but it was like herding cats.

Morpheus, the Greek mythical god of sleep and dreams, was unavailable.

Perhaps I couldn’t sleep because I was awake in someone’s dream.

I can’t prove it, but I think it was because my wife’s pajamas were too loud.

“What’s wrong?” asked my bride, awakened in the middle of the night.

“I can’t sleep,” I moaned.

“That’s nice dear,” she said. “Now go back to sleep.”

Reverend Fick gave us all kinds of wonderful advice during our premarital counseling, but he didn’t cover thermostat setting or choosing a side of the bed. Those were important omissions. He did say that a clear conscience made a soft pillow.

I’ve been a reluctant, but skilled sleeper all my life. I’ve often slept too little and I am a light sleeper. Noises like thunder, cars with bad exhaust systems, sirens, barking dogs, a cat hacking up a hairball or a fly walking on the ceiling wake me. My brother Donald could sleep standing up or walking. He was gifted.

I’ve played audiobooks and lectures on tape while sleeping in the hopes of learning in my sleep. I learned that I don’t learn anything that way.

The inability to sleep is a problem for many. Sleeping isn’t a job that we clock in and out of. I told my wife that I was so tired that I needed to sleep for 20 years. That’s not a good idea. Washington Irving wrote about Rip Van Winkle who lived in a village in the Catskill Mountains in New York with his wife and children. He was an easygoing man, kind and gentle, with a nagging wife who constantly criticized him for his inability to make money. One day, Rip went squirrel hunting in the mountains and met a group of ornately dressed, bearded men who were playing nine-pins. Rip didn’t ask who they were. Instead, he began to drink Hollands (Dutch gin) with them and soon fell asleep under a tree.

Twenty years later, Rip woke up to find that the world had changed. His musket was rotten and rusty, and his beard was a foot long. His wife had died. His kids were grown. At first, the only person in his village who recognized him was Peter Vanderdonk, the eldest man in the village. Eventually, Rip’s married daughter Judith brings Rip into her home. Rip learned that the men he met in the mountains were rumored to be the ghosts of Henry Hudson’s crew, which had vanished long ago. Hudson was a famed explorer who had discovered the Hudson River, although the Mohicans, Lenape and others might dispute his claim. Though Rip loved his family, he felt alienated and unable to adjust to the fact that 20 years had passed. He told and retold his story in the hopes of keeping the old traditions alive.

I even left myself a mint on my pillow in the hopes that would bring the Sandman, but all it brought was a chocolaty growth of candy on my forehead. It was an edible mole.

I didn’t have the flu. I’d been washing my hands so much that my bones were starting to show through. At least, I don’t think I had the flu. My medical degree may have expired. I looked through the junk drawer where everything I own resides, but was unable to find my diploma. The old joke was about the doctor who prescribed sleep for his patients with insomnia. I’d loaned out my polysomnography (sleep study) kit to a school bus driver in the hopes it would eliminate his deer-in-the-headlight look. Besides, sickness brings sleep for me.

I managed to drift off by pretending that my wife wanted to talk to me about us taking scented candle-making classes between ballroom dancing sessions. I feigned sleep and fell asleep. Sleep is heaven-sent. I was sleeping, trying to avoid all but one pillow, when I awoke to a glowing light over our bed. I felt swell, but I’m battling a serious ailment, so a light over my bed is worthy of my attention. I waited for a voice. I heard no command, “Follow the light.”

What I heard was, “The power went off again.”

It was my wife moving about in the darkness by the lighted screen of her iPhone.

My conscience was clear, but I couldn’t sleep.

Maybe I was too excited about breakfast.