In Dreams

Sleeping is one of my talents.

I'm very good at it. It takes practice, of course.

I can't even begin to tell you all the places I fell asleep in my twenties. Winter is the best time for falling asleep when you're out with friends, because there will always be a giant pile of coats somewhere.

I've even invented a mythical creature that helps people fall asleep: the sheep-spider. Remember the time scientists added spider genes to goat DNA to come up with goat milk that had some of the proteins of spider silk in it? So that they could produce spider silk on a large scale?

How do you not remember this?

Anyway, my genetic project is a giant white spider that spins a woolly cocoon around insomniacs and gently rocks them to sleep. (And because I have been asked: it eats grass, not comfortably dozing humans.) Yes, it's another million-dollar idea. No one would ever need Ambien again!

With a few tweaks, the sheep spider could also weave dresses like In Dreams. How cool would it be to have spiders spin your clothes directly onto your body?

I mean, unless you're scared of spiders. Then you probably wouldn't enjoy it overmuch.

I inherited In Dreams from my super-styling Grandma, whom we've discussed. Yet another frock rescued from disuse by the bracing effects of OxiClean! The plain white hue can be a little simple, especially for a maximalist such as myself, but that is easily remedied with a few silk scarves. Three is best... four would be a bit much, I mean, really.

These beautiful scarves, by the way, came to me via my other Grandma, on my dad's side, as did the earrings.

I love combining the scarves from one grandmother with the dresses from the other. I feel like it concentrates and multiplies the... I don't want to say power, but you know how you feel when you are wearing something worn by someone who loved you? It's like that, but more so.

If I had to pick between inheriting kicky frocks from my grandmother,

and getting them spun directly onto my body by an as yet unimagined genetic hybrid,

I might ask for one of each.

What would you do?

All photos by Claire Loeb! Except for the scarves.