Narcolepsy and Possum Children

Bodice and lining hand stitched together and ready to receive the sleeves.

Sleeve components together with lining, ready to be set in to the armscye of the bodice.

Skirt forepart piped and attached to skirt sides and back. Starting to look like a costume gown.

The strange title for this post comes from a discussion of the myth and mode behind the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty that took place in a college class I took on magic and religion. The professor asked for themes interwoven in the tale and I piped up with necrophilia, a woman weakened, impotent and rendered harmless.

After the class quit laughing, he agreed with me that indeed, that could be one of the psychological readings of the story. We discussed the Sleeping Queen that would be awakened in the Spring as part of a fertility ritual and I threw in another fifty cents with the fruit that put her in a narcoleptic state in the first place. How apropos that it would be Eve's apple, the Fruit of Knowledge.

Now. You could go on forever, or for at least a good long time serving up one implication of this, fractal the Prince and his gig with comatose Princesses and the angst between the Evil Queen and Beauty. But. I brought this up to let you know that I'm there with Beauty.

I've slept most of the week and feel I need more. My skewed diurnal cycles have interfered with getting my obligations done. I should have had more done in less time, but have been feeling enormous fatigue. Some of it I attribute to recurring chronic fatigue syndrome. I'm also convinced that the psaltery that we've had to listen to in D.C. over the bailout has made me crave an escape.

Most of all, I find it ironic that I'm costuming a character who echoes what is going on in my life with the theme of sleep. One of the perks of living life on the vampire side of the clock is that I get to see the night critters here at Dogpatch. This little child is an orphan who's mama wasn't quick enough for the road. I know that you're not supposed to feed the wildlife, but when you're this young, a steak ain't easy to find so I put out cat food mix and water.

She brought along a twig for her tail to rest on. The bowls are almost six inches across for scale reference.